Angels, Demons, Asians and Vampires
by BananaNutCrunch
Summary: An angel and a demon are actually minding their own business, this time, but when one member of the undead decides not to take his fate lying down, they find themselves dragged into a whirlwind of chaos on Earth. Really, dead people can be so tiresome.
1. Introductions and Whatnot

**Have a drink, you're going to die anyway.**

* * *

><p>Two years after the resurrection (and untimely demise) of Earth's biodegrading army, things have been more or less peaceful. But that's no fun, is it? One vampire and his lackeys are finally ready for a grand reappearance that's been a long time coming. Finally having found a way to get over his vampiric disabilities, Tino's on a mission to remind everyone exactly why they should be afraid of things that go bump in the night.<p>

Once again, the old gang is reluctantly reunited, along with a few new additions. It's a rag-tag team for sure, but they're all the world's got. And they're going to need all the help they can get, because these vampires don't sparkle; they fucking _shine._

* * *

><p><strong>The Cast<strong>

**Team Heaven:**

Arthur

The angel in charge of carrying souls to Heaven. He's been around since before all this new-fangled Iron Age nonsense, so he's quite senior in rank (not that anyone cares). He's been trying to lie low since the whole zombie dilemma and not get into any more trouble, but, well. We'll see how that works out.

Gabriel

Also known as the Archangel of Having A Stick Up His Ass. But _somebody_ has to do the work around here, dammit! The only reason Heaven's running so smoothly is because of Gabriel's military and tactical precision. God knows they wouldn't be able to operate without him. Gabriel does not have time for your worthless Feelings, not even when the biggest Feeling of all has brown eyes and a stupid-looking curl on its head.

God

What it says on the tin, really. He says He can't be bothered with Earthly drama, but don't let that fool you. He's addicted to people-watching the way some people are addicted to daytime soaps.

Alfred

Or Al, for short. Normally he likes to do his own thing, but curious members of the public have reported that he seems to be spending a lot more time with his Dad nowadays. But what do they know? Al's only hanging around to make sure Arthur doesn't get kidnapped again. Right? Right.

**Team Hell:**

Francis

Ferryman of the river Styx. His job's a bit dead, so he indulges in Earthly pleasures to pass the time. He's been working a lot of overtime to make up for his part in the recent Almostocalypse. He's not really looking for excitement, for once, but things have a funny way of happening when least convenient, don't they?

Gilbert

Belonging to Heaven, by right, but bought off by Hell to do paperwork. After all, there's nothing more aggravating than a dyslexic trying to spell your name. Gilbert doesn't mind much, though. It's better to be an employee of Hell than it is to be one of its customers.

The Devil

The artist formerly known as Prince (of Darkness), and currently known as the CEO of Corpse Corps. He's got billions of souls under His command, but there are always the few that just won't _listen._

The Devil's Musicians

A trio of strings. They still don't speak.

Feliciano

Hell's receptionist, although he's pants at dealing with telephones. Like receptionists everywhere, he doesn't really do much. That suits him just fine.

**The Others**

Death

A pretty girl, if a bit pale. She's actually quite affable and dead polite, although people tend to get a bit anxious around Her. She doesn't understand why, though. _Life_ is the one you have to worry about.

Tino

One of the oldest bloodsuckers of all time, although you wouldn't guess from the way he smiles. He's been living in the shadows for a while now, but once he gets his soul back, rest assured, all the garlic in the world won't be able to save you.

Berwald

Dirt, holy water and a medley of incantations make for a quality golem, although whoever made Berwald might have added a little too much water. Despite his softness, he still leaves a Very Big Impression. He'd follow Tino to the ends of the earth, and maybe a little further.

The Cult

A group of Satanists who met six years ago at a Bjork concert. Right now, they also act as Tino's groupies. They're getting pretty good at incantations, although due to limited funding, they've been forced to set up shop in the basement of a ladies' salon.

Sadiq

A man who works at the ladies' salon. His guitar, dulcet tones and excellent cheekbones have made him a favourite among the patrons, although his comfortable life is about to take a turn for the weird. And where the fuck did all these cats come from?

Herakles

Gentle, handsome and introspective, Herakles is destined to become a celebrated member of the philosophical circle in a few short years, because what is life without deep thought? Life is a beautiful, complex thing, and…hang on, this isn't ancient Greece. How disconcerting. Oh well, at least there aren't any Turks.

Wang Yao

Chinese clairvoyant extraordinaire, and now the owner of a cozy little fortune-telling agency. Most of his clientele consists of little old ladies, but once in a while someone comes along bringing a whirlwind in his wake. Can't say Yao didn't see this coming.

Kiku

An unfortunate young man who has had _quite_ enough adventuring for a lifetime, thank you very much. Still, old man trouble shows mercy to no one. Why do these things always happen on Thursdays?

Im Yong Soo

Ever since Brian (whose real name is really Gilbert) left, things have been a little dull. What better way is there to stave off boredom than to get thrown headfirst into another supernaturally-themed apocalypse?

The Canadian Kid

No, whatever you're selling, he doesn't want it, alright? He's just here to watch this time.

and

The Tourist

It doesn't matter what the question is. The answer is always yes.


	2. The Prologue: A Thursday

Two people can keep a secret, if one of them is dead.

Or if one of them is a yak.

This is the principle on which The Temple operates, perched on one of the more precarious peaks of the Himalayas, in south Tibet. It's on the second highest mountain (approximately twelve feet shorter than Everest, to be exact), which is a very clever way of hiding in plain sight. Travellers looking for a challenge settle for nothing less than Everest for a climb, and anyone not gutsy enough to brave the harsh snow would attempt a much less lofty peak.

The Temple is only called The Temple. It has no other title or nickname. It does not need one, because nobody knows it exists. It is one of mankind's best-kept secrets, and it has not been on a map since the time of the Vikings. There are only two people in The Temple at any given time. One of them is, indeed, a yak.

The other one is a monk. There is always a monk at The Temple, despite how long it has been since The Temple was first set up. There is even one there now. His name is Akar. How old he is cannot be determined. Nobody knows he exists, because he has been living in the temple for almost all of his life. He has been entrusted with a very important task. He keeps a book.

It is an old book, and despite its obvious importance and need for secrecy, it is covered with no ornaments. It is written in leather and ink, having been faithfully copied by hand from the original (which was written on a stone tablet, and has since been broken up and its pieces scattered along the mountains). Its cover is withered and old. Akar cannot read what is written, because the language has long since become extinct. But he keeps the book safe nonetheless, wrapped in skins and hidden under a stone altar. He does not know what he is guarding against, but he knows it must never happen.

Akar is not lonely, even though the yak is not a very good conversationalist. Both he and the yak are of easy temperament and things are calm. People, at one time, used to say that Akar was born under a lucky star, and that his life will be a peaceful one.

They were wrong.

* * *

><p>It is night. The sky is black and the snow is white. Everything is silent.<p>

There are two figures hiking up the mountain. One is abnormally tall, and the other is petite, made to look even smaller standing next to his companion. This is not the first time strangers have wandered into this sacred area, but it is the first time this has happened at night. Akar cannot see very far into the darkness, so he lights a lantern and makes his way into the open to redirect these people elsewhere. He feels bad doing it, because although he knows that nobody must enter the temple, he also knows that it is dark and cold and they are probably hungry.

(He does not know how right he is.)

He approaches them. The tall one remains hooded, but the shorter one waves a hand in greeting and allows his cape to fall away from his face. Akar pauses. Something does not seem quite right, but he can't put his finger on what.

The small man comes right up to Akar, and smiles. The meagre lamplight makes him look alien, sharpens his teeth. Akar can't make out the rest of his features very well, but notes how bony and gnarled his hands look despite his youthful face.

"Hello," says the man in accented Tibetan. He has a pleasant voice.

"Good evening," replies Akar, politely. "Are you lost?"

The other man smiles wider. "Yes, I'm afraid. We came here on holiday to climb the mountains, but we may be on the wrong one."

"Travellers don't come here often. There is nobody else on this mountain. You will probably be trapped here until daybreak," replies Akar.

The man doesn't lose his smile, despite Akar's words. "I see. It's lucky that we found you when we did."

Akar falters. He really shouldn't let them in, but to turn them away would be inhumane. He sighs. "Come in, then. Life is humble here, so my home does not have much, but you're welcome to some food and warmth if you wish."

He leads them into The Temple. The big man remains silent and hooded. The small man surveys his surroundings, gaze lingering on the stone altar. Akar is becoming more nervous. He beckons them away from the main hall and into one of the smaller, warmer chambers. He swallows the niggling feeling of worry and smiles, clasping his hands together. "This is my home, gentlemen. What will you have to eat?"

"B negative," says the man smoothly.

Akar frowns. "I'm sorry?"

"B negative," the man smiles again. "It's my favourite. Although I won't complain if you don't have it. It's been a while since I last ate, and you have been a most gracious host." In the light, his teeth do not seem any less sharp.

Akar swallows. The stranger smiles.

"You know, I don't think I'm lost after all."

He lunges.


	3. Thursday Night

**I've only just realised that I clean forgot to reply to the reviews. How very rude of me, I'm sorry. Hello, Guest! Kudos for managing to track me down while being in anon. Glad to have you back for the second journey, and thanks for reviewing! **

* * *

><p>Arthur sneezed.<p>

He hadn't meant to. _Puppies_ sneezed, when they put their noses where they didn't belong. Humans sneezed when their frail little bodies got too cold. Trees sneezed, albeit extremely slowly, when inconsiderate birds left feathers and bits of fluff all over their branches. God sneezed too, actually, but only because the noise amused Him.

Arthur allowed himself a moment of self-directed affront. Francis laughed.

He wiped his nose indignantly and craned his neck to see any straggling human souls, ready to tell them to approach the Portals in an orderly fashion. Francis waited in his ferry some distance away. "There appear to have been more than the usual number today", he called to Arthur, who didn't turn around to shout his reply.

"It's Christmas! Holiday seasons are the worst, really."

For an angel, Arthur didn't particularly like Christmas. It wasn't that he didn't enjoy the celebration of God's metaphorical son's birthday. Jesus was a nice lad and all that, but everyone in Heaven knew that humans had been doing it on the wrong date for centuries. Arthur had asked once if this bothered him, but Jesus, bless the boy, had just been happy that anyone had thought to celebrate his birthday at all.

His toga blew a little in the wind, but Otherworldy endurance was such that one could easily stand in the same place for years and not feel a thing. He flailed his arms around a bit to displace the pigeons that had mistaken him for a perch. "Winged vermin! Look, there's a nice bloody big tree right in the middle of the bloody street with baubles and things to sit on, so get the bloody hell off of _me _why don't you! Do I look like a bloody bird bath?"

They didn't budge, but a few did spare Arthur disparaging glances. He'd always had this trouble with birds. Alfred had said that they must feel some sort of kinship with angels, what with them having similar wings and all. They never seemed to bother demons (although cats, for some reason, did). Dogs, Arthur noted, would wag their tails at anyone as long as they got a belly rub out of it.

Francis laughed at him again. Arthur bellowed at him across the snow to shut up.

"Where is your holiday spirit?" Francis replied cheerfully, stepping off his ferry. "We're done for the day, and the decorations really are spectacular this year. I hear the tavern across the road serves particularly good eggnog. We should verify this."

Arthur huffed. "Well excuse me for being high strung. Unlike you I'm actually _working_. God hasn't let me have a moment's peace since…" he trailed off and eyed Francis suspiciously. "Here, what about you? I can't imagine Beelzebub is being lenient with you. Are you not being punished?"

Francis avoided his gaze and instead set off in the direction of the aforementioned tavern. Try as he might, Arthur couldn't get a word out of him about the Devil for the rest of the day.

* * *

><p>There's a little bookshop on a street in New York called The Plot. It sells second-hand books and dusty old tomes with cracked spines and yellow pages. The shop is owned by a man named Jeremy. It's not doing very well.<p>

The Plot, however, has not yet gone out of business for one reason and one reason only. Its basement doubles up as both a café and a place to store the books that never get sold. This café is called The Plot Hole.

The coffee is crap and the cashier is a cheerful old man who gets everyone's orders completely wrong, but although the place is normally avoided by adults and people with good taste in coffee, the bored kids of the city flock to it like moths to a flame that conveniently looks nothing like Starbucks. It's the ironic and old-fashioned décor (which isn't so much décor as strategically used space and general lack of trying) that intrigues the ones who shy away from the mainstream. The Plot Hole has become the unofficial headquarters of the hipster population of New York.

Jeremy himself has no idea what the term "hipster" means, but that's really not the point.

One Thursday (the significance of this day is lost on most people, but to the few who know Certain Things, it is a weekly harbinger of doom), there was a young man sitting in The Plot Hole with his very tall friend, who happened to be wearing sunglasses. It was nearly ten o'clock at night, but given the usual crowd, it is possible that he only wore them to be ironic.

"I just love night time in the winter, don't you?" sighed the smaller one, leaning back in his seat and laying his iPad flat on the table. His friend said nothing. The one with the iPad smiled.

"Look at all that snow. Makes everything look perfect. Years and years and years on Earth and I'm still not sick of it." He stroked his finger lovingly across his iPad's screen. "But that just may be because the snow does such a good job of covering things up."

The tall man grunted. The smaller one smiled.

"You could try saying something once in a while, Berwald. It's a little like I'm talking to a chair."

Berwald considered this for a second. "Yes,Tino,"he said eventually.

"That's what I like about you. You always know what to say."

Berwald stayed silent. Tino laughed.

"Oh," he said suddenly, glancing at his iPad and then showing it to Berwald, who frowned at it momentarily before turning back to Tino. "Look at them, I like them. There are just three of them. That will take some getting used to, but it's just so much more _efficient_. I don't even know what we were thinking in the old days. I mean sure, a big old following has _pizazz_, but they can be unruly. I like that word, don't you?_ Pizazz._"

He pursed his lips. "Tacky website, though. It's like I'm looking into the inky black asshole of Cthulhu. But, well. It's better than the Official Temple of Satan, at least. And look oh, Berwald, look, they're all _blonde. _How adorable. I want them."

Berwald grunted. Tino continued scrolling.

"They spend every Saturday night at the same bar," he pursed his lips. "How dull. Although, people do tend to be, don't they? Well. We'll take care of that, I think. Come on, you big gorilla."

He stood and Berwald followed. Tino tucked the iPad into his coat, tossing far too much money on the table to pay for the frappuchinos they hadn't touched. Berwald held the door open as Tino waved to the old man behind the counter. They stepped out into the snowy street and Tino stretched his arms and sighed, watching the traffic and people go past with a smile on his face.

"Look at all that white," he said. "Completely unblemished. Makes me want to stain it."

"Yes?"

Tino grinned. "Yes. Maybe with red. I _like_ red."

* * *

><p><strong>About four years ago, Era (senderunknown) and I created The Plot as the basis of a cute group of characters. We never continued it. Shame, really. <strong>

**If you clean your ears while bathing, it is wet. **

**Reviews are appreciated. Have a nice day!**


	4. Wednesday Night and Thursday Afternoon

**So sorry for the late update! Busy year sighs. Figures I'd only update once my papers had actually started hahahaha I'm gonna fail.**

**"Wasn't Berwald the guard playing the harp in ADA&Z? When did he become a golem?"**

**-NERVOUS SWEATING-  
><strong>

**I've been found out. **

**HHAUEHUAEHEAU there are two explanations for this actually! The first one isn't so glamorous unfortunately. When I write fanfiction I like to stick in a bunch of random cameos (not for any particular reason other than they're fun to spot) and when I was writing ADA&Z I didn't think there would be a sequel. If I'd known ADA&V was happening I wouldn't have been quite so careless with my cameos!**

**Another thing though, this actually happens more than once and it's isn't always unintentional. I mean, there's an Alfred in this story, but Matthew also has a human brother who fits the same description... the two don't have anything to do with each other but they're similar! Basically what I'm saying is that there's sort of more than one of each character floating around this universe. It doesn't matter all that much really idk hahahaha I didn't really think this through.  
><strong>

* * *

><p>Part of being a human, Tino thought, was the need to have music so loud you could feel it rattle your bones and reverberate inside your skull.<p>

Didn't matter. Tino had been human once, after all, and although a lot of things had changed about him, he still liked music. The bass was so heavy he couldn't even hear what the rest of the song was supposed to be, but then again it was hardly realistic to expect to hear Bach playing in a nightclub so Tino didn't even bother getting annoyed.

"One must get with the times," he said quietly to himself over the rim of his glass, and smiled sweetly at the bartender. The bartender shrugged.

Tino glanced at the entrance. Berwald was Looming, and the bouncers had apparently stuck a badge on him and left him to scare the patrons while the rest of them all went off for a drink. A small invisible barrier had formed between him and everyone else, although Berwald didn't seem to mind. He stood immobile and watched the crowd, particularly the bar. Once in a while, his foot would tap. Tino turned his gaze away, and took a fortifying sip of his drink. Then he stood, pushing himself away from the counter as he did so.

The moment he turned around, someone bumped into him. He dropped his glass.

A blonde head only slightly taller than his own whipped around to face him, and Tino felt two hands plant themselves on his shoulders. Just for show, he pretended to lose his balance, and the man who'd bumped into him tightened his grip to keep Tino steady.

"Shit, I'm sorry," said the man, looking down at the shattered glass on the ground. "I didn't see you. Did I get you wet?"

Tino inspected his shirt. "No, thank goodness. This was one of my favourites." He looked up and laughed reassuringly. "It really doesn't matter. No use crying over spilled alcohol."

The man slowly released Tino's shoulders, and scratched the back of his neck. He seemed embarrassed. "I should get you a new one, at least. What were you drinking?"

Tino smiled placidly. "Bloody Mary."

The man nodded and waved to the bartender, who gave him an evil look for destroying his glassware. The man's face coloured slightly, and Tino laughed. "I feel like you're bribing me. Are you going to buy me a drink and then walk off?"

The man blinked. "Should I not?"

Tino shook his head. "Of course not. Come join me." He flopped carelessly onto a bar stool and patted the one next to him as the bartender slid a brand new Bloody Mary across the counter. "I'm Tino."

"Nikolai." The other man smiled minutely and sat down. He ordered something with absinthe in it. Tino raised an eyebrow.

"Scandinavian?" he asked.

Nikolai nodded as the bartender gave him his drink with bad grace. "Norway. How did you know?"

"Rare to see anyone drink absinthe if they're not Marilyn Manson. Also your accent."

"I see. You're from around there?"

"More or less."

Nikolai lifted his glass. "I'll drink to that. It feels like forever since I've been home," he sighed. "I came here a while ago to study but now I can't afford to go back."

Tino had suddenly noticed that the seat of his barstool could be rotated, and was now twisting around cheerfully. "Really? What did you study?"

_"Poetry." _Nikolai snorted into his drink morosely, and Tino patted him on the shoulder. "Stupid of me to think of America as a land of opportunity. Should have known nobody would appreciate the arts."

"So what do you do now?"

"I work as a cashier," he said, and then winced.

"Yikes. Culture shock?" asked Tino sympathetically.

Nikolai chuckled darkly. "Culture shock is too mild a phrase. You don't feel the same way?"

"You have no idea," replied Tino, and ordered another drink.

* * *

><p>Nikolai stuffed his hands in his pockets and huffed, breath misting in front of him. He wasn't a stranger to the cold, but he'd skimped on paying the rent this month so his landlord had cut off the heating. To be fair, winter in New York was less harsh than the ones he'd faced growing up, but five years of sticking around had made him soft. He'd toyed with the idea of getting himself deported occasionally, but the money saved on airfare probably wasn't worth the stress of living with his neurotic mother and her sixteen cats.<p>

He reached the salon door. Sadiq didn't offer him much in the way of greeting. "Your friends are here. Make sure to lock up and leave the key under the mat," he said, and left before Nikolai could give him an answer. He watched him go morosely, and then opened the door and made his way to the basement.

He was, if at all possible, even more sullen than normal. He'd left his god-awful work a little early last week to skulk around their local club for somebody to talk to who would appreciate his knowledge in poetry instead of listening with glazed-over eyes. Admittedly, he could have done better than a bar, but he doubted he'd get satisfactory drinks if he'd gone to a library instead. He went every week, knowing that he'd come home disappointed but somehow unable to draw away from the routine of it. His Saturdays, therefore, were generally spent sulking at home with the beginnings of a hangover.

Until last week. He'd met a cute stranger, talked a lot, drunk even more, and then stupidly told him about what he did every Wednesday night. That was, Nikolai was fairly certain, the reason that his phone had not rung at all since he'd left the club (except on Sunday, when his mother had called to check up on him. And Tuesday, when Ari had called to borrow some money).

He reached the basement and opened the door, where he was promptly bowled over by someone much larger than him.

Mattias, normally more excitable than a pug on crack and even more so that day, pointed to the end of the room. "You have visitors!" he enthused, and then leaned down to loudly whisper, "I like the short one."

Nikolai made no real attempt to disentangle himself, but swivelled his head to see the newcomers nonetheless. A very tall man with a barrel for a chest watched him impassively. Next to him, Tino waved.

Nikolai jumped to attention. "Wha-Tino! You're here!"

Tino laughed. "You did invite me. Although I can tell you, it was hard finding the place."

"He stayed outside for twenty minutes until Mattias thought to let him in," piped up Ari helpfully. Nikolai frowned. Tino, however, patted Ari on the head.

"It was only ten minutes. And it's alright, I had my little brother to keep me company," he gestured to the man on his left, who represented Little much the way fish represent bicycles. "His name is Berwald. Say hello, Berwald."

"Hello," Berwald said obediently, and then lapsed into silence. Tino beamed and made no secret of inspecting the basement.

Nikolai glanced around at the various death metal posters stuck haphazardly on the walls among shelves of beauty products. He surreptitiously began scuffing out the remains of a messy chalk pentagram with the toe of his shoe. "So you're a fan of this…occult business?"

"In a fashion," Tino replied, peering into an online-bought cauldron. "The truth is, there was something I wanted to try, and I thought you would be able to help me since I've never been very good at this sort of thing myself. Never had quite enough soul," he laughed. Nikolai laughed too, albeit nervously.

Tino was, at first glance, a handsome man. On closer inspection, he was stunning. His features were perfect, if slightly fake, but Nikolai had no qualms with the odd nose job. He'd gladly entertain Tino's requests, no matter how mad they were likely to be, if it meant he had a problem was, naturally, that he had no magical talent to speak of. The Cult (which they'd never gotten around to naming, because Mattias had insisted on a superhero name and Ari had wanted to them to be named after an unpronounceable volcano) had been in practice for a while, but had never actually produced anything; mostly they met up as an excuse to wear funny robes and make voodoo dolls of his store manager. He hadn't even really _been_ that much into the whole cult thing, at first. He'd just been a lonely college kid with a slight interest in mythology and lots of free time.

He'd known Mattias and Ari for ages. They'd all met at a concert some six years ago; Bjork, to be exact, although all three of them later agreed that electronica wasn't really their thing. At first, the only reason he hung out with them was because they were all more or less from the same area. But then, much like a mole on your back that you don't notice unless someone points it out to you one day as you're changing in the gym, they'd grown on him.

And alright, he loved them, in an exasperated sort of way. They were idiots. And Nikolai would never admit to them being _his_ idiots, but they were at least idiots he could stand.

They were, however, utterly useless at practising the occult because Mattias kept giggling in the middle of ceremonies and Ari had the mechanical ability of banana slug.

If he said yes to helping Tino, they'd end up making fools of themselves. It would be wiser to graciously decline.

Naturally, he said yes.

* * *

><p>"Tell me Mr. Yao, how is my Johnny doing?"<p>

"Yes, yes, I'm getting there," Yao said good-naturedly, peering into the bottom of Mrs. Stubbs's teacup. The tea leaves were beginning to congeal into a thick dark clump. Yao didn't even bother trying to make out a shape. Instead, he took a surreptitious glance at his cell phone. The tea leaves were a sham (an excuse to try out his new Oolong, really; strictly speaking Mrs. Stubbs should have been the only one drinking it, but there was no point letting a whole pot go to waste now was there?). He'd been texting Johnny all afternoon.

He'd been difficult to find, at first, since his name was quite common, but Yao managed to locate him based on Mrs. Stubbs's descriptions after half an hour (bit on the short side, scar from being bitten by a great big dog, used to poison himself on a monthly basis from leaving his lunch too close to the dead bodies at the hospital in which he used to work).

The phone vibrated and Yao smiled. "Johnny's fine, ma'am. Met a nice girl there and everything."

Mrs. Stubbs frowned. "That's odd. I always thought my Johnny was partial to the menfolk. Not that he ever discussed it with me, but he had this flatmate once and the two of them just-"

Yao patted her on the hand. She was a nice lady, a bit lonely since moving to the apartment block from another country. Ever since Yao had set up the fortune-telling agency, Mrs. Stubbs had become a regular customer. Most of the time she asked about her dead son, sometimes she asked about her dead husband. Sometimes she and Yao just sat down for tea and a chat. Soo and Kiku were quite fond of her.

It was nice. Everything was going well. Yao missed his old job, to a certain extent, but he was enjoying his new one. He didn't have to work too hard. They'd already redecorated the apartment, which had been previously been lacking in traditional Chinese grandeur. Now Kiku and Soo did most of the heavy lifting, throwing glitter everywhere and turning on the fans to make Yao's fancy bathrobe swish dramatically in the wind. All Yao had to do was to look mysterious and get very good at hiding at his phone where the customers couldn't see.

Mrs. Stubbs gave his hand a grateful squeeze. "Thank you, love. It's very reassuring, having you around. I'm sure I'd go mad worrying about my poor boys if you weren't here to keep me updated."

Yao grinned. "Anything I can do to help. No charge this time, Mrs. S."

The old lady frowned. "Now that's exactly what you said _last_ week, dear, I couldn't possibly-"

Yao waved a hand dismissively and helped her to her feet. "It's fine, it's all fine. You brought us a whole clementine cake, remember? It was delicious. That's payment enough for a few sessions at _least_."

She smiled and allowed the door to be opened for her. "You're an awfully sweet young man," she said. "Have a nice week, alright?"

"Yes, ma'am," Yao waved her off until she entered the lift. He shut the door to the apartment, whistling.

His phone began to vibrate in his pocket. He frowned and pulled it out, thinking it must be from a customer since he'd already said goodbye to Johnny and shouldn't have been receiving any more spirit texts.

But oddly enough, there was no return number. And the text only said one thing. _Trouble_.

Yao stared at his phone, and then looked up to check the calendar on the wall (decorated with swirling Chinese dragons- a bit gaudy, but very effective for the overall ambience). It was Thursday.

"Fuck."

* * *

><p><strong>The next update should be some time next week, I think!<br>**

**As always, reviews are very much appreciated! Thanks for reading everyone! **


	5. Friday Morning

**Four papers down, three to go!**

* * *

><p>Gilbert reached down to pat one of Cerberus's three heads. He'd grown quite fond of the thing, even if it thought of itself as a lapdog despite being strong enough to crush all his ribs at once. Each head (which he had named Asther, Blackie and Berlitz for the sake of convenience) had its own chew toy, but had decided to chew on his shoelaces for the day instead.<p>

He adjusted the plaque on his desk, which he was told read _Head Clerk_ in subtly stylized letters. He was, in actual fact, more of a receptionist than a clerk, but Corpse Corps already had one of those and Gilbert hadn't been about to take his job. Besides, Feliciano worked on the mezzanine and dealt strictly with Otherworld folk, while Gilbert's (rather more glamorous) job involved the dead souls of the sinful.

Far more enjoyable, really.

He considered the main lobby. It was nice, he conceded, if a bit posh-looking for a hillbilly like him. He also needed a very strong table lamp because the walls, floors and most of the furniture were black. Different _shades_of black, yes, but still black regardless. Heaven had, he thought, been rather prettier, but there hadn't been very much to do. He got bored after a week, and when he'd been offered a job at the Other Place, all it took was affirmation that Hell had all the best musicians to make him pack his bags.

The glass doors slid open.

Let it now be known that a man died on December the twenty-fourth. This, in itself, was not unusual. Many people die every day. Around half of them are male. We shall call this particular man, for the sake of the story, Mr Zwingli.

Mr Zwingli was not, in actual fact, an especially bad person. He was, however, a generally_ unpleasant_ person, which, believe it or not, can have quite an effect on a person's soul over time.

Mr Zwingli used to live in a pretty little cottage on a pretty little hill in a pretty little part of Switzerland. He had a pretty little sister and a not-so-pretty (and very large) shotgun. Because of Mr Zwingli's foul temper and the fact that he had quite a lot of money hiding under the mattress (because as a Swizz citizen, ironically, he did not trust the banking system), Mr Zwingli started becoming very paranoid about outsiders trying to steal the family fortune.

Which is why, when his younger sister brought a nice young man home without warning her brother first, the rifle on the wall stopped being decoration and spent the rest of its life under the title "Exhibit A: Suspected Murder Weapon."

(It should be mentioned here, perhaps, that Mr Zwingli did not realise that the shotgun was loaded and fully functional until it was far too late. His sister maintained that he was innocent, but nonetheless he went to court and accepted his punishment with good grace. Unfortunately, he ultimately failed to carry it out, as his sister, who suddenly got it into her head that the gun was at least fifty years old and _couldn't_ have been loaded, decided to test this theory out. With the barrel pointed at her brother.

Needless to say, Miss Zwingli is now a sole heiress to the family fortune and is doing very well for herself indeed.)

And so the unfortunate Mr Zwingli found himself unceremoniously ferried across the river Styx and face-to-face with a very intimidating set of glass doors to an office building bizarrely named Corpse Corps. It was, against all expectations, quite pleasant.

Gilbert stared at him for one point two seconds before he got impatient, and called him over. He cracked open his big black log book, noting with some smugness the way Mr Zwingli eyed Cerberus with distrust.

"Name?"

"Vash Zwingli."

Gilbert wrote this down and showed it to Mr Zwingli for conformation. Mr Zwingli furrowed his brows and asked what language Gilbert had written his name in, which Gilbert took offence at and made sure to keep his writing extra neat at his next attempt. It was still wrong.

It took, in the end, approximately half an hour before Gilbert finally succeeded in writing a perfectly spelled, albeit messy, _Vash Zwingli_ in Hell's registration book. Mr Zwingli, beginning now to feel an appropriate sense of despair, peered at Gilbert's nametag and forced himself to utter a shaky thanks. "Thank you, Mr…Giblet."

Gilbert gave him an odd look, tucking the book away and putting his feet up. "You'll wanna go and join the queue in the hall. The guy at the counter will tell you what to do next." He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. Mr Zwingli nodded and left.

Berlitz put its head in Gilbert's lap. He scratched behind its ears distractedly, wondering what kind of name _Giblet_ was supposed to be, and how someone could possibly get it wrong when he had written it so clearly on his shitty little nametag.

Still, he supposed, he should be understanding. Not everybody was fortunate enough to be able to read.

* * *

><p>Tino drew, with a practiced hand, the last vertex of the complicated-looking symbol . He stepped back and surveyed his work.<p>

The tacky Halloween store witching tools had been, at Tino's order, been thrown out in favour of items which, he knew from experience, actually worked. The (utterly meaningless) pentagram had been scrubbed out and replaced with runes that, if looked at for too long, would give one a headache and severe feelings of nausea. In the middle a small box was drawn in red, approximately large enough to sit in. Berwald stood slightly to the side, holding Tino's bag and observing the proceedings. In the bag was a book carefully bound, never to see the light of day.

Mattias, Ari and especially Nikolai gazed around them in awe. "I've never seen these symbols before. What do they mean?" asked Nikolai, looking over Tino's shoulder. Tino said nothing, instead taking him gently by the hand. Ignoring his hopeful gaze and later yelp of pain, he pricked Nikolai's finger and allowed three drops of blood to fall into the middle of the box.

It began to glow.

Nikolai's mouth shut abruptly. Tino smiled at him sweetly and gave his hand a final squeeze, and then tugged his iPhone out of his pocket and began to read something off its screen. It made Nikolai's head hurt to hear. Involuntarily, he covered his ears and crouched into a ball. The air in front of him shimmered and warped until he screwed his eyes shut and gagged. Conflicting feelings of warmth and icy coldness assaulted his senses. Then all sound stopped.

He looked up. There was a girl standing in the room, where Tino had drawn the red box.

She was very pretty, in a cold, inorganic way. Her pale skin and hair looked faded, like an old picture. Her eyes, an absurdly light grey, were dead.

"Hello," said Tino pleasantly. She stared at him impassively.

"I have seen you before."

Tino grinned at her. "Yes, you have. And You're seeing me again, although for the last time, I'm afraid."

Mattias uncurled, releasing Ari from his protective grasp. "Who is she?"

Tino laughed a bright laugh like the tinkling of bells. "Why, my dear Mattias, this is Death, and she's going to do us a favour."

* * *

><p><strong>A short chapter this time. <strong>

**Thank you for reading and I will love you forever if you review! Have a nice day, everyone!**


	6. Friday Afternoon

As a cherub, Alfred had had a bad habit of running around naked.

As an adult, he wasn't much different.

"Bloody- would you put some pants on, you daft boy?"

Alfred stopped in the middle of the hall and turned. "Can't. They're all in the laundry."

"They are _not._" Arthur paused in separating his own laundry to point at the baskets surrounding the washing machine. "Do you see a basket full of pants? No. I've washed them all and put them in your cupboard. Now go put some on."

"Dude, you washed my _undies. _My pants are in one of those baskets somewhere."

Arthur sighed. "Pants and undies are the same thing, Alfred," he said as patiently as he could. "The ones I haven't washed are _trousers_."

"Huh?"

"For crying out loud." Arthur rummaged in a pile of clean laundry and pulled out a sock. He tossed it at his son. "There. Cover that thing up or something. And for goodness sake don't let anyone see you."

"Sure," replied Alfred.

* * *

><p>The Canadian kid wandered along an overgrown path, skipping over the cracks in the pavement. The clouds were nice. The people were nice. The food was nice. Things, in general, were nice. He didn't feel like killing himself, which was an achievement. Elizabeta was back at the apartment somewhere, probably still asleep. She liked to nap on Sunday afternoons.<p>

He grinned a goofy grin. She liked to nap _naked_ on Sunday afternoons.

He stopped walking. There was a man standing on the sidewalk, blocking the way, apparently so he could watch the clouds go by. The Canadian kid cleared his throat softly. The man turned. He was completely naked, except for a sock covering his essentials.

"Hey," said the man.

"Hey," said the Canadian kid.

"Nice day out, huh?"

"Sure is," the Canadian kid agreed. Then he paused.

"Uhm, excuse me," he said. "This may seem a little rude, but why are you wearing a sock on your junk?"

The man turned to face him fully and gave him a very strange look. "I can't exactly be walking around naked, can I? There's _kids_ here."

"Ah. Right, of course," said the Canadian kid a little helplessly. If this hadn't been Heaven, he would have been rather more alarmed. "My mistake. Uhm, see you around, I guess."

He tried to walk around the man in the street, but the stranger didn't budge. Instead, he continued to stare at the Canadian kid, this time squinting his eyes slightly. "You look pretty familiar," he said.

The Canadian kid blinked. "I do? I'm pretty sure we haven't met before."

"No, we have." The man's face split into a broad grin. "You may not remember me, but I remember you."

"You do?"

"Yeah." The man took a step closer. The Canadian kid involuntarily took a step back. "Listen," said the man. "Do you remember being around thirteen or something? You were having a really rough day, and then when you got home you went up to your room without talking to anyone and you pulled your sleeve back and-"

"Shut up." The Canadian kid took a step back and looked around to see if anyone had overheard, even though they were completely alone. "Shut up. You don't know what you're talking about. That never happened. I never told _anyone_, how did you know-"

"I was there." The man grabbed the Canadian kid's face. "My name is Alfred. I've been your guardian angel since you were ten years old."

The Canadian stared at him. "Guardian angel?"

"Uh-huh. That's what I do. I take care of sad kids and keep them safe. I'm a _hero_. And you, you were one of the saddest kids I ever met. I had to watch you like a hawk so you wouldn't hurt yourself."

"What? But I tried to."

"You never succeeded!"

There was a moment of silence as the Canadian kid absorbed all of this. "So every time I tried to commit suicide …"

"I saved you," finished Alfred triumphantly. "I was looking out for you all along. Saved you from that bus, stopped you from drowning that one time, fixed up your car so the brakes worked okay." He reached out to grab the Canadian kid's shoulders and pull him into a brief, brotherly embrace. "Poor guy. At least you're in Heaven now, right? You don't need to be sad anymore. You got me!"

"The only reason," said the Canadian kid quietly. "The only reason I survived for so long was _you_."

"Sure is!" Alfred pulled away and laughed. The Canadian kid smiled, drew his fist back, and punched him square in the face.

* * *

><p>Sadiq allowed himself to be patted on the head. "It's not your fault, dear. Sometimes things change for the better."<p>

He hummed and stroked her hand affectionately. Mrs Stubbs, seventy-three years old and grandmother of six, was one of the more frequent customers, and she generally tended to have sweets on her person which Sadiq didn't really like but always accepted when she offered. Both of them had been standing at the front desk for the past half hour, staring at the lobby of the decadent, if slightly tacky, day spa. Something was wrong. He'd been trying to figure out what it was for the past twenty minutes or so, but couldn't quite figure out what had changed about the décor. The doors were still made of polished wood, and the floors were still made of faux marble, and there was still a large vase of plastic flowers on the front desk.

The door opened, and Mrs Stubbs's nephew came in to pick her up. He looked around. "Oh, what happened to that big old statue you used to have out in the front?"

Mrs Stubbs clapped her hands in delight. "There you go, dear! That's what's different. The statue's gone. Isn't that a relief?"

Sadiq blinked as she left arm in arm with her nephew. _That's_ what it was. He shrugged and went back to his guitar. Nobody had been in since Mrs Stubbs, and nobody had made an appointment either, so he was free to do as he pleased until Mrs Hudson showed up for her facial at four thirty. She was right, he mused, plucking a string idly. It was a relief to finally figure out what had been so different. He'd been hung up over it all day, and finding out it was just a missing statue was a balm on his unsettled nerves. It was good to know what was gone.

Although, why anyone would want to steal a plaster statue of a naked man was beyond him.

* * *

><p>A young man wandered around the streets of New York with the type of smile that never really leaves your face. The world was beautiful and new it felt good to be alive. New York, in particular, was stunning in all its urban charm, and he noted with no small amount of awe how buildings seemed to scrape the sky with their commanding steel skeletons. He didn't particularly enjoy the cold, but the snow softened the imposing cityscape so magnificently that, he decided, he quite liked winter this time. He shivered and rubbed his hands together to keep them warm, because he'd miscalculated the day's weather and left his gloves back at the boarding house. It would have been nice if his family had been able to come on this trip with him, but he supposed being alone and serene was a nice feeling too.<p>

He stopped to buy a hot dog. The man at the stand scrutinized him as he pointed to an impressive looking fried sausage on a stick, and then asked if he was a tourist.

"Yes!" said the young man cheerfully.

The hot dog man smiled, and charged him three times the usual price.

* * *

><p>Somewhat perplexed and seated uncomfortably on an upturned bucket, Herakles considered the possibility of omniscience and omnipotence being present in the same being.<p>

If God, he reasoned, knew all that was to occur in without being bound by the constraints of time, then surely He would be powerless to change the events of the future, as by doing so He would then be wrong about what He had foreseen. However, this should then mean that God was, in fact, unable to perform any actions contrary to the foreseen future, which negated the possibility of God being omnipotent as He would be rendered incapable of acting of His own free will. That then raised the question of whether it was more likely that God was omniscient or omnipotent, and which would make Him more powerful.

Herakles realised, somewhat belatedly, that he was in a lavatory, and that skulking in lavatories was no way for a young philosopher to behave. He stood slowly, body protesting at having been seated in the same position for so long.

He left the lavatory in search someone who would be able to tell him where he was and how he had arrived there, as the last thing he had really remembered was taking a relaxing bath. This did not, to his credit, alarm him unduly, for being a man of wisdom he was quite aware that unexplained phenomena were essential to the existence of the human universe (in fact, as his teacher had said, mysteries could possibly be the work of the Gods, an elaborate design to make sure that humankind exercised its thoughts often and well). Because of this, Herakles was honoured that he had been chosen as the next one to experience the unknown.

He poked his head around a pillar. The décor in this building was, in his opinion, slightly tacky, but the architecture was _fascinating_. The smoothness of the walls and uniformity of the tiles were almost mechanical in its precision, and, to Herakles's utter amazement, a box in the ceiling appeared to be blowing warm air into the room. Whatever world he was in, it had the most amazing engineering.

He wandered around until the corridor opened into a much larger chamber, with a small fountain of water in the middle and a large desk at the end. Sitting in a plush chair at the desk sat a dark-skinned man strumming some sort of lute.

Herakles cleared his throat.

The man at the desk looked at the door, and then looked around until his eyes met Herakles's.

"Oh, statue's back," he said mildly.

Herakles did not understand this. He understood even less when the strange man hopped out of his chair and tried to drag poor Herakles into the fountain.

He snapped at him. "Stop, you madman! What on earth do you think you are doing?"

This oversight was unfortunate, because the man paused, and then let out an unholy shriek and fell over backwards. Herakles wondered at this for a moment, and then it occurred to him to look at himself in the reflection of the fountain. When he had done this the strange man's reaction suddenly seemed absolutely justified.

Herakles appeared to be, regrettably, a statue.

* * *

><p><strong>Aaaaaah yes I understand now why ADAV seemed so different from ADAZ (its predecessor). It's the lack of long-ass nonsensical ANs that took up like 27% of the word count last time.  
><strong>

**A while ago (and I mean a shamefully long while ago) somebody asked for...eh, I can't quite remember what is was, but it was an Alfred-Canadian interaction, and I decided early on that Alfred, being the hero and all, would definitely be a guardian angel to our intrepid Canadian. I did try writing a cute one-shot about it but that...never worked out really (lol)  
><strong>

**"Ah, the Canadian, he died for love. So calmly."**

**Being in Heaven is technically an improvement, though. We'll miss you, Canadian!**

**Has anyone seen Free! Iwatobi Swim Club?  
><strong>

**they are sO SEX **

**HNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHH AND THEY'RE ALL CUTIES TOO ESPCIALLY U NAGISA U LITTLE SHIT**

**Pre-U is over! Celebrate all the things!**

**Now I just have to get into uni! :'D**


	7. Saturday Morning

**Ack I'm so sorry for the lack of updates recently. Didn't I say I was busy (doing nothing at all)! I'm a beautiful butterfly that can't be tamed!**

* * *

><p>Gabriel frowned.<p>

This, in itself, was not particularly unusual, because Gabriel's face was one that was not really made for smiling. Neither his square jaw, nor his towering frame, nor his blonde hair slicked back to within an inch of its life allowed for any visual representation of happiness or good cheer. Rather, his countenance was suited almost exclusively to various shades of disapproval (he could do Scorn particularly well; in fact it was so potent that even God quailed before it sometimes).

What should be noted, rather than the actual frown, was the reason behind the frown. What Gabriel had noticed, and had been puzzling over, for the past five minutes, was that it seemed he had made a mistake in his Accounts.

For the sake of clarity, two things must first be explained. First: Gabriel's Accounts had less to do with currency than they had to do with inventory. For time immemorial, Heaven and Hell have been in possession of a number of Divine Manuscripts (or Divine Paperwork, as these things are commonly known). Among them are the Archives, which are a detailed (and slightly biased) recording of every occurrence that has ever happened since the beginning of Time, the Book of Fate, in which anything that is written is fated to come true (although this had to be locked away once God lost the Eraser of Fate), and the Accounts, which contain the number of souls that have ever entered Heaven and Hell respectively, complete with dates, names, times, places and miscellaneous information too vast and plenteous for the human mind to comprehend.

The second thing to remember is this: Gabriel never made mistakes.

He snapped the book shut and concentrated his gaze onto a patch of unsuspecting wall, which began to smoulder slightly. The last time an angel had made a mistake in the Accounts, there had been a mess. It had worked out alright in the end, and the resulting human holiday was quite pleasant (although involving rather too many pumpkins for Gabriel's liking), but the escape of several thousand souls from the Otherworld was not a prospect that sat well with him. So far his Accounts were only off by two, but things could escalate quickly and the issue was best nipped in the bud.

He snapped his fingers impatiently. Beside him, the fabric of reality crumbled like cheap mortar. He stepped through the inter-dimensional rift and into Filing.

Filing was, for the most part, unchartered territory by anyone who wasn't Gabriel. To the naked eye, it looked much like an infinite, ethereal plane consisting of stacks upon stacks of filing cabinets reaching up to heights invisible from the floor, each cabinet containing the particulars of every single soul who had ever been born on Earth from the beginning of time, typed neatly on single-line paper. To Gabriel's expert eye, however, Filing was an infinite, ethereal plane consisting of stacks upon stacks of filing cabinets reaching up to heights invisible from the floor, each cabinet containing the particulars of every single soul who had ever been born on Earth from the beginning of time, typed neatly on _recycled_ single-line paper.

He had no real idea, of course, where to begin. The Accounts in his hands showed only that one soul was missing from Heaven, and one from Hell. There were details of each and every one of Heaven's residents, but these were useless to him as there were literally billions of names; it would take him far too long to go through the vast Filing cabinets to pick out which one was missing. A better option, he reasoned, would be to ask for assistance. As much as Gabriel was loathe to appear in any way weak, his unwillingness to add to his already impressive blood pressure meant that he would rather endure the indignity of having to ask for help in doing his job.

He stepped back into his corner office, Spartan and no-nonsense despite its huge size. One soul missing from Heaven, and one from Hell. As far as Gabriel knew, Hell had been managing is own Accounts for the past few millennia. He had, he realised, no clue what the employees of Hell (now childishly renamed Corpse Corps) had written down in their ledgers. The answer to his questions could very well be somewhere under his feet. Perhaps he had misunderstood the situation. Gabriel never made mistakes, it was commonly known. Therefore it was entirely plausible that had a mistake indeed occurred, it may have been _Hell's _fault, not his. Perhaps Hell had been sloppy with its documentation and made a slight oversight; this would clearly have accounted for the confusion. He furrowed his eyebrows at his abused wall, causing the wallpaper to crackle gently.

There was no need, he reasoned, to shuffle in requesting assistance; he was well within his right as the Bookkeeper of Heaven to forcefully enquire after Lucifer's records (for the sake of accuracy, at least; if he was going to continue to balance out his accounts perfectly for the next few million years, he deserved to have access to all sources of information available). He could, theoretically, demand to see Hell's paperwork, since everyone knew Hell was sloppy with its work ethic, and in the process perhaps try to find more information about the truant souls.

With a quick word to his secretary that he would be busy for a while, he spun on his heel, spread his wings, stepped out of the window and soared.

* * *

><p>Feliciano drew invisible patterns on the tabletop with the tip of his finger. Around him, busy demons bustled back and forth, not actually doing anything constructive but <em>appearing<em> very impressive nonetheless. He eyed the phone, willing it to ring. To his disappointment, it didn't.

(One might, at this point, recall the events of a previous and very similar story involving zombies. To put matters into perspective, the beginning of the Almostocalypse had been caused by an innocent telephone call. Francis, the Transporter of Souls, had given Feliciano a call with instructions to carry on with the Transporting while Francis himself went on holiday. Through a basic but entirely predictable misunderstanding of technology and the way it worked, Feliciano thought it was _actually the telephone_ that was speaking to him, and so completely missed the fact that he was meant to take over driving the ferry across the river Styx. The resulting backlog of souls had no choice but to return to their corpses, causing them to rise from the dead, hungering from human flesh, trying to open the gates of the Otherworld to free their kin. Understandably, this caused a great deal of chaos and additional paperwork.

The humans, adaptable bunch that they were, forgot about the incident within a week, but Feliciano now knew the importance of being able to correctly handle a telephone and was, needless to say, getting very good at answering the thing. In fact, he was beginning to rather enjoy it.)

He'd been bored for a while now. His friend Alfred (not a bad fellow, for an angel) had already called yesterday, and Francis was busy as usual, so it was really getting very dull. The other demons didn't seem interested in having a chat, either, so, much like a fiddly tropical plant, Feliciano was starting to wilt from the lack of attention.

When the sliding doors opened and an angel strode in, Feliciano's joy was only slightly dampened by the scowl on the newcomer's face.

The angel approached the front desk, and Feliciano peered at his shiny nametag. "Hello, Gabriel! Oh gosh, Gabriel, you're really important, aren't you? I hear your name all the time, although it's not always nice things, in fact it's almost never nice things at all, ahaha. It's weird, you look just like what I was expecting, except that I thought you'd have longer hair. What brings you here? Are you here for a visit? Shall I get some coffee?"

Gabriel wasted a few precious seconds standing around with an eyebrow raised. "I am the Winged Messenger of the Skies and the right hand of God. Please, do _not_ address me as though I were some low-level harp-slinger, Mister…" he took a glance at the hastily-written placard on the desk, "Feliciano."

"Sorry, Mister Gabriel," Feliciano offered his sweetest smile. "I'm a little new, so I've never met anyone from high up before. Did you still want that coffee?"

"I do not want your coffee," replied the Archangel tersely. "I need to have a word with your Accountant. Who keeps record of the entrance of souls into Hell?"

"It's called Corpse Corps now, you know," said Feliciano good-naturedly, taking the opportunity to admire Gabriel's biceps. Thunderous expression aside, the man wore a toga well. "I don't know who handles our soul count, but there's a Head Clerk downstairs who writes everything down when people come in in a black book. His name is Gilbert, you can find him in the lobby. Maybe that will help?"

Gabriel nodded his head in thanks and headed to the elevator. As pleasant jazz music filled his ears, he thought with a sniff that Hell had changed a lot in the past century. The last time he had deigned to Descend, it had taken three washes to get the smell of brimstone and sulphur out of his uniform. The change, although bizarre and entirely misleading, was actually quite welcome. At least, Gabriel thought, it was clean and he wouldn't have to worry about getting any ash on his pristine white toga.

The doors slid open. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the darkness (the black-on-black-on-black decoration was entirely inefficient, albeit stylish). Almost instinctively, he headed towards the lit table lamp, the only source of light in the void of nothingness.

Behind the lamp sat a slightly myopic-looking albino with Cerberus at his feet. Gabriel cleared his throat. Cerberus wagged its tail in greeting and the youth, clearly not a demon, turned to him and grinned.

"You ain't dead, are you?"

"I am an Archangel. And you, I believe, are the dead human Gilbert."

The grin widened further. "How'd you know? You come here to hit on me, big guy?"

Gabriel pursed his lips. "Hardly. I simply remember writing the receipt for your exchange. You died in October two years ago, and were subsequently employed in Hell, although I don't particularly care as to why. I was told you've been keeping a log of souls. I need to see it."

Gilbert snorted. "Shit, no need to gush, I can see you're enamoured with me." Handing over his log book with one hand and scratching Asther's ear with the other, he peered at Gabriel's nametag. "So, what are you doing all the way down here, G…Gandalf?"

Gabriel scowled. "That is _not_ my name. My _name _is written very clearly on my _nametag,_ as you would see if you'd take two seconds to look. Have you noticed any inconsistencies in your Accounts recently?"

"Accounts? Like, my paycheck? Are you from the IRS? I didn't know I was getting paid for this, I should probably get a credit card or something-"

"_The Account for souls_," Gabriel sighed in irritation. Honestly, why employ a human when the entire species clearly knew nothing of the inner workings of the Otherworld? "My records show that there is a soul missing from Heaven, and one missing from Hell. I was hoping that the discrepancy might be a result of an oversight on your part."

"Why my part? Why not yours?"

Gabriel spared him a withering glance but did not deign to respond. "Your logs are terribly messy. Why have you written and crossed things out so many times? What a terribly inefficient use of paper," he muttered under his breath, making Gilbert chuckle sheepishly. "These entries only date back to July. I'd like to see the rest, please."

"Sure thing, Garry." The log book changed hands. With a soft _clack_, Gilbert turned his placard over on his desk. On the other side, Gilbert assumed, was a short and elegantly-worded message that the receptionist was out and would be back shortly.

Hell's concept of documentation was…lax, at best. While Gabriel's filing space was near perfect, the Accounts of Corpse Corps were less a collection of files than a jumble of loose sheets of paper. The paperwork was, Gabriel had heard, in the process of being transferred into softcopies, which he had to approve of (in theory, at least) because it seemed an efficient way to save resources. This meant, however, that half-finished ledgers were everywhere, centuries-old documents were lying around collecting dust, and the electronic transferring had basically come to a complete halt because nobody had thought to tell Gilbert that he should be the one doing the work. Gabriel could almost feel his molars disintegrating as he ground his teeth in irritation at the mess; he knew Hell had always been fairly laidback about order, and when asked, demons would try to shift the work onto each other until nothing got done, but this was just _appalling._

Gilbert, somehow not seeming to sense this frustration, simply coughed at the dust and shrugged. "It's like a hobo's armpit in here, and it gets on my nerves, but like Hell am I gonna go through all this shit just to clean up somebody else's mess. Come on, I keep my stuff in the corner."

This corner, as it turned out, was fairly organised, immediately making Gabriel respect the new Head Clerk just a little bit more. Resolutely ignoring the rest of the room, he thumbed through the earliest of Gilbert's entries. Frowning deeply, he settled himself on the edge of a box and quickly scanned each page in the log book.

"I apologise," he said finally, waving the book in front of him. "It's embarrassing to admit, but I'm not familiar with this language. At this rate, I'll never be able to figure out the source of the problem. I wonder if there is some form of translation somewhere?"

Gilbert snorted. "It's pretty weird that you're speaking in English but you can't read it, dude. Do you want me to find you like, a dictionary or something?"

Gabriel balked. "_English?_ Some of these letters don't even look _real."_

"Excuse you, I have messy writing, okay?" Gilbert snatched the log book away and held it to his chest in mock defense. "It's not my fault you can't read."

"I can read perfectly well, but anyone would have trouble deciphering your attempts at hieroglyphics!"

That startled a laugh out of Gilbert. "Hiero- you take that back! Your name may be Gumball but you're bitter as hell, you know that?"

"My name is _not_ Gumball!" Gabriel snapped, throwing his hands up. "I refuse to deal with you any longer! I am filing a complaint!"

Gabriel paid no attention to Gilbert's snickering or Cerberus's attempt to engage him in play as he stormed back to the mezzanine floor. Feliciano, initially cheerful, quailed immediately upon seeing his expression.

"Uhm-"

"Your Head Clerk is an _imbecile," _Gabriel hissed, fingers leaving dents in the countertop from the force of his grip. "He stands there with gibberish written in his books, trying to convince me that _I_ am illiterate. Is this his attempt at mocking me? Are all the employees of your establishment this ill-mannered?"

Feliciano, who had slowly sunk lower and lower into his chair until only his eyes could be seen over the top of the counter, looked around for assistance. None came. He risked glancing back at the infuriated angel only to find a glare boring holes into his skull. He squeaked.

"He's not trying to be mean, he just doesn't like to tell people he's not so good at reading."

"Are you telling me that your Head Clerk cannot read?"

Feliciano sat up warily. "Didn't you know? The only reason Mr Lucifer brought Gilbert here was to annoy the customers."

"What?"

"He's dyslexic," Feliciano said with a nervous smile.

To his credit, Gabriel only screamed a little bit.

* * *

><p><strong>Having a dyslexic doing your paperwork aggravates not only bad souls, but angels as well. It's a two-in-one plan that Lucifer just couldn't pass up! You might wonder if the people in Hell don't sometimes get irritated with Gilbert, but the truth is that nobody in Hell ever does their paperwork anyway, so it's really not that much of an issue.<strong>

**Looking at Gilbert's personality, you'd imagine he'd be sort of a slob, but it's actually canon that he's just as much of a neat-freak as Ludwig. Who knew?**

**Fun fact; it's always been a headcanon of mine that while Feliciano makes pasta to die for, Romano's pizza is unbeatable. After a bit of searching, it turns out that the modern pizza originated in Naples, which _is_, in fact, in the South of Italy. So Romano's specialty really is pizza! Hooray!**

**I really don't like the name Lovino. Lovino sounds like Bovino which makes me think of cows and it just seems...very unattractive for a stylish/grumpy Italian. I'm going to stick to Romano. Romano-Feliciano interactions make me exceptionally happy. **

**Please please please review! It would absolutely make my week if you did and...to be honest this is literally one of the few things keeping me going right now ahaha. Thanks for reading and drop me a line!**


	8. Sunday Afternoon

**And now, back to the show!**

* * *

><p>Francis flicked a pebble in Arthur's direction. "Nice weather we're having, isn't it?"<p>

Arthur flicked it back with his foot. "It is, actually. Snow's pretty, sky's blue, no wind so it's not all that cold."

_Flick. _"There is a bit of sun, as well. I find it rather pleasant, especially since you don't often get this much sunshine in your average Finnish winter."

_Flick. _"I agree with you there, old chap. It's been a good while since we've been able to relax like this."

_Flick._ Francis stretched his legs out, leaning back onto the sidewalk with a contented sigh. "What a lovely day. I do like this weather very much."

_Flick_. "Couldn't be any better." Arthur fiddled with the strap of the sandal in his hand, one bare foot tapping the cobblestone. "And you've finally got the chance to wear that nice new scarf you bought."

"Yes, I was looking forward to finally using this. Blue suits me, no?"

"It rather does."

_Flick._

_Flick._

_Flick._

Arthur stood up and threw his sandal on the ground. "WHAT IN THE NAME OF ODIN'S RAVEN IS GOING _ON?"_

Francis wailed. "I don't know! I have seen not one soul in days! It is as though humans have stopped dying completely!"

"How is that possible?" Arthur demanded, not really expecting an answer. "Humans always die! There are accidents, or old age, or murder, or sickness…this is unheard of! Not _once_ in over seven thousand years has so much as a day gone by without me having any work."

Clutching at the side of his head with one hand, Francis gestured wildly with the other. "Perhaps there is a misunderstanding," he said, eyes wide. "Perhaps there is a new system where Transportation is done automatically. It is silly to think that people do not die, perhaps we are simply missing them."

Arthur rounded on him. "Utter bollocks! We have been through _every _Portal today, and have not run into even _one_ of the dead. I smell something fishy, and I'll bet my halo it's someone's fault. Where is Death? I'd like to have a word with her!"

Francis tugged at the ends of his hair, ruining his perfect waves. "Yes, yes, absolutely. It's most certainly Death's doing, perhaps she's gone off on a holiday and we simply have yet to be informed?"

"I wouldn't be all that surprised, considering we did it once. Either way, I'm sure she can explain all this. She'd better, anyway," Arthur muttered under his breath.

"We'd best summon her. I wish she'd carry around a mobile, though. Having to draw runes is always a huge pain."

"It can't be helped, she's almost as old as God Himself, after all." Arthur knelt and began tracing patterns in the snow with the tip of his finger. "Funny, even though we work in such close proximity, I barely ever speak with her."

"Neither do I. She is not much of a conversationalist, although she is quite delightful to look at."

"Focus, you." Arthur stood and plucked a feather from his wing, dropping it into the middle of the perfectly-drawn symbol. "I must say, I'm rather good at this Summoning business."

"The best," Francis replied dutifully. They waited for a response.

None came.

"Now _that's_ just rude."

Francis worried his lip, placing a hand on Arthur's shoulder to stop the impending rant. "She always answers. This might explain why nobody has died recently. Perhaps something has happened to her."

"Happened!" The angel threw up his hands in angry resignation. "How could something possibly have happened to her? _She _ happens to _other people_."

"If you're worried, perhaps we should consult someone."

"I'm _not_ worried," Arthur snapped, although he was, really. Tapping the edge of his halo, he held up a hand to silence Francis. "Hold on, I'm calling Gabriel."

The halo buzzed. Francis, long used to the idea that the seemingly innocuous golden hoops actually functioned as communication devices, got up to locate Arthur's missing slipper. Gabriel's end rang four times before he answered; a sign that he was probably busy, and was going to be in a disagreeable mood.

"Gabriel speaking."

Arthur took a deep breath and set the call to speaker. "Hello there, mate. Arthur here. Spot of bother," he said, quite politely.

Gabriel's voice was simultaneously clipped and harried, although that was hardly new. "What is the problem?"

Arthur glanced at Francis, who had emerged with Arthur's shoe and was clutching it anxiously. "Well, this is going to sound odd, but I do get the feeling that nobody's dying."

There was a pause. "Pardon?"

"We've been in and out of the Portals for a couple of days now, and, funny thing, there's not a soul to be seen. I'm not using that figuratively, either, I mean there is literally not one soul waiting to be taken to the Otherworld."

"_What?" _came a bark in reply. "What have you done?"

"I haven't done anything, thanks," Arthur responded rather coldly. "Really, a fellow takes _one_ unofficial holiday and suddenly everything becomes his fault. I've only been trying to do my job."

"Is the Ferryman facing the same problem?"

"Yes, and he's right here with me, in fact."

"Hello," said Francis.

"Good afternoon," replied Gabriel. He clicked his tongue on the other end of the line, and Arthur imagined him massaging his temples. "Absolutely not one soul? Have the humans noticed yet?"

"I don't think so." Arthur glanced around at the people walking down the street. "They seem to be in holiday spirit." Unconsciously, the humans avoided Francis and Arthur, parting around them instead of walking through them. Although they were currently invisible to the naked eye, walking _through _members of the Otherworld often made humans intensely uncomfortable. Arthur was once told the sensation was similar to passing through a spot of damp. An unflattering description, but a fair one. Having somebody walk through you, Arthur could attest, was equally unpleasant and felt much like having your bones trying to tug their way out of your back.

Gabriel made a noise halfway between a growl and a sigh. "And have you contacted Death?"

"We tried. She didn't answer."

Thoughtful silence. When he spoke next, Gabriel's voice was grave. "That is strange. It might be necessary for you to find her personally. She is not the type to shirk her duties. I do not like to think what could have incapacitated her so."

"You have always been a worrywart," said Francis soothingly, even as he shared a look of unease with Arthur. "She is probably fine."

A deep rumble of agreement came from the other end. "Make sure of this. And while you're at it," Gabriel added as an afterthought, "tell her that there is an anomaly in my Account-keeping, and I would like to have a word with her."

"An anomaly?"

"Do not concern yourself with that, it's my problem to solve. Hell is absolutely no help in this situation," he grumbled under his breath. "Fix the issue with Death before it becomes serious. Report back to me if you find any information of use."

The line went dead. Arthur huffed. "Not so much as a goodbye," he complained. Instinctively, Francis reached out to adjust his counterpart's halo so it sat straight.

"She does not associate much with the Otherworld, does she?"

"There'd be no point, since we're immortal." Arthur scuffed out the runes with his bare foot, ignoring the sandal Francis proffered. "Honestly, it never rains but pours, does it? First zombies, and now this. How utterly ridiculous."

"To be fair, the zombie fiasco was mostly our fault," said Francis amicably. "Now, how does one find Death when she refuses to answer?"

"We see if she left a trail," came the reply. "Where was the last place we saw anyone dead? New Delhi, wasn't it?"

"Uganda," Francis corrected. "New Delhi was before that."

"Uganda, then. If we're lucky we'll see traces of her somewhere." He opened a miniature portal. It looked unremarkable at first, a bit as though someone had cut the air with a pair of scissors. Within a few seconds, though, it started to part, reality on Earth bunching up at the sides like a set of curtains.

Inside was Francis and Arthur privately called the Transit, the space between Heaven and Hell. It wasn't much to look at; just four doors facing each other at opposite ends. To reach Heaven, one would have to take the door on the right and fly upwards. To reach Hell, on the other hand, one would have to open the opposite door and cross the river Styx, which would take one straight to Hell's gates. It didn't matter which door was which in relation to where you were standing. The one on your right _always_ lead to Heaven, and taking a left turn _always_ brought you to Hell.

This unassuming rift between dimensions was actually, as its name suggested, an unofficial transit from Earth to the Otherworld, and indirectly the one they used to Transport souls. The official Portals (the important ones, the ones with the capital letters) were fixed. They were scattered all over Earth, set up wherever humans gathered the most.

However, there were only two Portals in Transit. The way they worked was peculiar.

Each and every Portal on Earth opened up into Transit, no matter where it was, and either of the two Portals in Transit, in turn, could take you anywhere on Earth. Time and space in Transit did not have to obey the likes of mere Physics; one could step into a Portal in Toronto, cross the Transit, exit the other Portal ten feet away and end up in Kuala Lumpur; and then come back in and enter the opposite Portal _again_ to get to Cairo. Heaven and Hell used that to their advantage; they were able to collect souls from all over the world without having to _travel _all over the world.

To make things easier, human souls, once dead, were able to see the official Portals and tended to gravitate toward them. That meant that neither Arthur nor Francis had to go running after them, because they would amass at the Portals by themselves. All the Transporters had to do was pick them up and run off with them, so to speak.

Of course, the Portals had to be closed whenever they were not in use. Left unchecked, any soul could waltz out of the Otherworld as it pleased. As they had recently discovered, unlocked Portals could also be opened from the _outside_, which was just as bad.

However, generally speaking, whenever an angel or a demon was feeling lazy or was a bit too far away from one of the big Portals, he or she could simply open a temporary rift which would take them directly to Transit. Humans, dead or alive, would not be able to enter. Given time, once a deity got very good at breaking the laws of Physics, each temporary portal would be unique. Arthur's, for example, opened with the sound of crackling fire and popping coal.

This was ironic for two reasons; firstly, because despite being an angel, Arthur's temperament and behaviour caused him to be mistaken for a demon fairly often (Francis would, when prompted, recount tales of Arthur's delinquency during the Dark Ages, often theorising that Arthur was really a demon with a superbly bad sense of direction). Secondly, legend had it that edible organic substances would, in Arthur's hands, mysteriously turn into carbon. Rather amusingly, Saint Nicholas gave up giving Arthur coal every year for this very reason.

Arthur stepped through first, leaving Francis to follow, still holding the abandoned slipper. The small portal closed behind them, and the crowd surged back in to fill the empty space they had created earlier. Life on this particular street in Finland went back to normal.

When they arrived in Uganda, Francis realised belatedly that he should probably have brought some sunblock.

* * *

><p>Meanwhile, on the other side of the globe, Tino smiled into his camera.<p>

"I _love_ selfies," he sighed, putting his feet up on the couch of the hotel room. Behind him, Berwald adjusted the lights, bathing Tino's face in a soft glow.

"A hundred new followers in just two days, huh, Mr Tino?" Mattias grinned. He was sitting upside-down on the loveseat, feet dangling over the back. Ari sat next to him, feet resting on the Dane's chest. The two of them seemed comfortable with the situation. Nikolai, however, shuffled his feet awkwardly, clutching a bottle of soda in his hand. It wasn't that he didn't _like_ what was happening, not at all. Tino was nice, charming, and very, very handsome. Berwald was helpful too, in his own stoic way, and his friends were… the same as always, really.

He just hadn't quite come to grips with the information that Tino was a _vampire._

That's not to say he hadn't handled the news well; Nikolai had always been dabbling in dark magic, and was therefore quite delighted to learn that they'd managed to meet a real, (loosely) live creature of the night. It was an honour, he thought, that Tino had chosen them as his disciples, never mind the fact that they hadn't done much so far besides managing his new Instagram account and going on grocery runs. Still, even as much as Nikolai was enjoying himself, there was still a small modicum of disbelief that this wasn't some elaborate prank. Just because he'd been hoping to meet a supernatural creature didn't mean he'd actually _believed_ in them up till now, and having the truth unveiled so suddenly was unnerving, if exciting. What made it worse was that Tino openly defied the constraints that vampires were supposed to adhere to. He showed up in reflections, had a stylish crucifix pendant, and just yesterday he'd suggested they plan a trip to Bali so he could spend a day at the beach. It was bizarre.

And, well, there were only so many times a man could eat garlic bread before he got sick of it.

Gingerly, he sat on the other end of the couch Tino was sprawled over. "You look like you're having fun," he offered.

Tino flashed him a smile, and Nikolai unconsciously found himself focusing on the other man's teeth. "It's vain, I know, but it's been a long time since I've seen my own face, you know? I never knew I looked_ quite_ this hunky," he chuckled.

"Well, that would explain how you've gotten so popular online, lately. Although, I'm a little surprised this is all happening. I mean, don't get me wrong or anything, this isn't criticism, it's just, this all seems a little _mundane, _for a vampire who's just gotten over his…disabilities."

"Hmm." Tino's smile faded, and he regarded his subordinate thoughtfully. "You think I should go bigger?"

Mattias twisted around so he was partially upright. Ari snorted at him, but he ignored him. "Are you gonna do something, Mr Tino? Huh? Huh?"

Setting down the camera, Tino considered this. "That sounds like a good idea. Oh! I know! How about we set up a _Tumblr_ as well?"

Nikolai frowned. "That wasn't-"

Tino laughed and patted him affectionately on the head. "I know, I know, you want to do something grand, don't you? All in good time, my dear. Be patient, we'll start rocking the boat soon enough."

"What are you planning?'

"What, are you writing a book? Don't worry your pretty head, I'll tell you everything someday. No more questions, alright? Now, how about Chinese food for dinner? I feel like fried rice."

Mattias rolled off the sofa, bringing Ari with him. "We'll go get it!"

"Thanks, you guys are really swell." Tino's gaze shifted to Nikolai. The door shut behind the other members of the Cult, but Tino paid their retreating footsteps no mind. He smiled at the young Norwegian man in the blue shirt, not quite platonically. "Although, I'd still like something salty on the side. Do you catch my drift?"

Nikolai blinked, coughed, flushed and reached out. His forearm, much like those of the rest of his Cult, was dotted with scabs (although Nikolai had noticed, with some pride, that he carried more marks). Tino took him gently by the hand and pressed a kiss to his wrist. "Close your eyes," he instructed.

Nikolai obliged. Moments later, he felt a sharp pain as Tino bit down.

Berwald offered him a glass of water when Tino had finished. Accepting it with a nod of thanks, Nikolai leant back against the sofa and watched through half-lidded eyes as Tino dabbed at him mouth with a napkin. He received a red-tinted smile for his efforts.

"Sorry, sweetie-pie. You know I have trouble keeping down food when I don't have the taste of iron in my mouth."

The boy made no move to respond, still woozy. The soft hand carding through his hair was welcome, and he made himself comfortable against the sofa cushion to wait for his friends to come back with dinner.

When his breathing had evened out, Berwald looked to Tino and rumbled a question. "Y'need the blood?"

Tino grinned. "Not really, but you know. I do like the taste."

* * *

><p><strong>Trivia from Angles, Demons, Angels and Zombies:<strong>

**Francis's portal opens with the sound of tearing fabric. This is ironic for two reasons; firstly, because he is literally ripping the fabric of the universe every time he opens a rift, and secondly, because legend has it that anyone who hangs around Francis never tends to keep their clothes on for very long (except, interestingly, for Arthur, who seems to have built up immunity over the millennia).**

**I had a teacher once who told me, "OI! Pay attention! Look, you know what I can do? I can go downstairs and I can buy a goat. And I can make it wear a pair of glasses, and I can put a graduate's hat and a robe on it. And then- of course, I'll have to feed it so it doesn't make noise- but then, I can make it look at the board and I can explain quadratic functions. And the goat can sit there and stare at the board for twenty minutes. Does that mean the goat is studying? NO! It's a goat!"**

**Those words of wisdom will stay with me to this day.**

**I'm so worried that this chapter was boring even if Zoe said it wasn't OTL She's too nice for her own good. Please tell me what you think of this chapter or my kokoro will be brokoro!**


	9. Wednesday Morning

"And you are absolutely certain this is the correct place, _Ange?_"

"As certain as I'm going to get," Arthur muttered under his breath, trudging through the snow and cursing his wet sandals.

Francis looked up. The building in front of them was fairly nondescript, but their trail had led them here. Death's last official place of operation had been Uganda. From there, the two had searched with for any traces of the dead with a metaphorical fine-toothed comb. It had been a painstaking process, but they'd eventually managed to find a faint trail of death that led straight to a ladies' salon in the outskirts of New York City. Arthur seemed not to mind this in the slightest, but given their previous history in the city (ie, a zombie invasion), Francis was beginning to feel uncomfortable.

Arthur knelt to cradle a wilting flower with the tips of his fingers. "She's here," he said quietly, glancing from Francis to the door in front of them. It appeared that they were going through the back rather than the front, but that may have been for the best. There was a considerable amount of noise coming from the busier area, and neither man of the Otherworld particularly fancied conducting an investigation in a throng of nosy humans.

Phasing through the door, the angel-demon duo found themselves in a dark room. Francis, bumping his head against a wall and probably leaving a nasty scrape on his left horn, scrabbled around until he happened upon the switches. The world flickered into view.

Or the basement did, anyway. On its own, it probably wouldn't have been much to look at, being filled with shelves and the odd miscellaneous furniture. However, the nondescript background went ignored.

In the middle of the room, seated daintily in a circle of light, was Death.

In different, more candle-lit circumstances, Francis supposed, she may have seemed almost romantic. A beautiful girl surrounded by a faint glow and the bodies of tiny unfortunate creatures that had met their end after prolonged exposure to Death's person. Under the glare of fluorescent lighting and the smell of cheap pine air-freshener, however, Francis looked at the dead insects and thought, _ugh_.

The angel had no such qualms, and quickly strode forward to smudge the lines of the magic circle with his foot. The light immediately faded. Death, taking Arthur's offered hand, stood and stepped over the boundary with no effort at all. "Thank you," she said, voice soft.

Arthur noticed he was smiling and immediately put a stop to it. "You've got some nerve, disappearing on us like that. I've been trudging all over the bloody world with naught but this loon for company and here I find you sitting on your bum looking pretty while we thought you'd been spirited away somewhere."

Francis slipped between the two, wrapping a reassuring arm around Death's shoulders. "What he means to say is that we were very worried about you, and are glad to see you safe. Isn't that right, Arthur?"

"Hardly." Arthur stood back to look properly at the ruined symbols written in chalk on the ground. "What's all this, then?"

Death, ignoring the arm steadily making its way down to her waist, frowned minutely. Cold grey eyes shifted to the stairs leading upwards and into the main area of the building. "I was summoned here and trapped."

Francis whistled. "When is the last time that happened?"

"A few thousand years ago," she said, frown deepening. "This magic was ancient. I do not know how _he_ found it. Lucifer told me that the humans had lost the knowledge."

"Not often you hear that name anymore," said Francis brightly. "Do the two of you still have tea every weekend?"

Arthur shushed him. "What do you mean, 'he'? Who found it?"

The shadows around Death's feet began to warp, snaking up her legs and onto her arm. "A man whose soul I took millennia ago, but whose body did not succumb to me. One of the race that preys on the living, seeking blood. A leech." The darkness took on a three-dimensional shape, solidifying into a scythe. The blade, razor sharp, was almost invisible head-on. "He asked for the return of his soul."

"What, so you gave it to him?"

"When I am summoned, I obey. It is required," the girl shrugged.

Arthur ran a hand through his hair. "So there's a vampire running amuck with possession of his soul?"

Francis, whose hand had been slowly drifting south of Death's back, was rewarded with a swift kick to the shin. He winced and hopped away to hide behind Arthur. "One minute. I thought the species was dying out."

"It's become harder to find prey, now that Death is so well-documented," Arthur said, gesturing to the woman in question. "Quite frankly I'm surprised this one's survived this long. He have a name?"

"I imagine so."

There was a pause. "Do you know what it is?"

"No." The scythe made a graceful arc through the air, making a soft _whizz_. Particles of dust, now in neat halves, drifted downwards. "However, I know when I took him. The twenty-seventh day of the summer solstice, four hundred and thirty-two years before the birth of Christ, three minutes after sundown." Following the movement of her scythe, a small portal opened. She stepped through, turning slightly to give a nod of goodbye. "Consult Gabriel. He will help you."

"You're leaving? Are you sure you're alright?" asked Arthur, who'd forgotten he was supposed to be gruff.

"There is much to be done," Death replied, closing the portal behind her. "I am behind schedule. Souls must be reaped."

She disappeared. Arthur sighed, turning to leave. "What date did she say, again?"

"The twenty-seventh day of the summer solstice, four hundred and thirty-two years before the birth of Christ, three minutes after sundown," replied Francis, who always paid full attention when a lady was talking. "To Gabriel's office, then?"

Arthur smacked his forehead. "Blast, I clean forgot to ask her about Gabriel's thing."

"Well, he did say there were souls missing, no? I suppose this would explain it."

"Let's hope so," Arthur muttered. He wasn't much in the mood to be scolded, even if it was from his superior.

* * *

><p>"I'm not quite sure why you are here."<p>

Gilbert shuffled the papers in his hand, almost upsetting his muffin but not noticing. "You looked like you were gonna pop a blood vessel. If you're gonna work, why not do it in comfort?"

Gabriel frowned. "…this isn't a _date_, is it?"

Gil made a face. "If this was a date, you wouldn't be paying for your shit. Or you might, actually. Equality and all that. But it's not a date. Sorry, but you're not my type."

Not quite sure why, Gabriel huffed. "Well, you're not my type either."

"I'm everybody's type."

"Not unless everybody has suddenly gone blind and deaf," the angel muttered.

They were in a cozy café in the outskirts of Heaven. Angels, residents and the odd demon crowded the mismatched but well-worn furniture. Because living above the clouds tended to get chilly, a fire crackled merrily in the hearth, giving off a faint glow and making the cream coloured walls look almost orange. Gilbert and Gabriel had the window seat overlooking the road, stacks of paper divided between them.

Gilbert was, unfortunately, right. They'd searched through Hell's old records until they'd both lost track of the days (the work was, naturally, prolonged by Gabriel's compulsion to neaten up Gilbert's illegible ledgers). The problem of Earth's lack of Death was both a blessing and a boon; on the one hand, he hadn't needed to add anything more to his Accounts, but on the other, it had been one more thing to worry about.

"You need to lighten up, Galadriel."

"That is _not_ my name."

The presence of two cups of coffee made themselves known. "Expresso shot for the albino, and a large black for the guy with no taste."

Gilbert blinked. "Feliciano, you work here too?"

The angel in the apron frowned, small wings twitching with irritation. "I'm Romano, dipshit. Feliciano is my little brother. The one without wings who doesn't work in a coffee shop in Heaven."

They blinked at his retreating back as he returned to the counter to make more drinks. "I can't see how he and Feliciano are related."

Despite himself, Gabriel cracked a smile. "He's usually less irritable. It's just that he has a particularly strong dislike of me."

Between taking sips of his expresso, Gilbert managed look of mild outrage. "What's his problem?"

"He resents the fact that I always order plain black coffee. That, and I accidentally let slip that I make coffee from a packet when I'm short on time. Apparently I have no taste and should be ashamed of myself."

"Oh." Gilbert shrugged. "I guess some guys are pretty serious about coffee. Coffee's great. Almost as good as beer. Where would I be without coffee? Still in bed, probably."

They both considered this for a moment, and then moved on with their lives.

"It feels wrong to be slacking when there is a mystery to be solved."

"Listen to me, Golfclub. You're not slacking. You're just taking a breather. There's nothing wrong with that, alright?"

"Are you even trying anymore?"

They were interrupted by a faint buzz. Gabriel held up a finger to silence Gilbert, and took the call.

"Gabriel. What? I do _not_ sound happy- why are you calling me, Arthur? Ah. She was unharmed? I see. Trapped? By a human?" He cast around for a pen, and then remembered he was an angel, and could simply materialize one out of thin air. He tugged a napkin towards him and jotted down what he was hearing. "Twenty-seventh day of the summer solstice…mhm. Mhm. Yes, I understand. I will get on it. Thank you."

"Everything okay?"

Gabriel straightened his halo and took a large gulp of coffee. "I believe the answer to our problems has just been delivered. You and I have some very old records to look at."

"Your place or mine?"

For his trouble, Gilbert was spared a withering glance. "I hope you suggest consulting Hell's book-keeping as a form of comedy joke."

"…can I at least finish my muffin first?"

"Absolutely not. We have work to do."

Gilbert sighed and stood, taking his food with him. "Good thing I'm already done with my coffee." As Gabriel drained the rest of his mug, Gilbert bit into his muffin with all the grace and etiquette of a starving hippo. "I really hope you appreciate all the work I do for you, Ludwig," he said, following his companion to the door. "I could be watching football right about now."

Gabriel wanted to both roll his eyes and sigh, and both urges ended up cancelling each other out so he remained impassive as he held open the door. "You know, Ludwig is not even _close_ to my name."

"Yeah, I know, but I've always wanted a little brother figure named Ludwig."

"I am literally thousands of years older than you."

"Too late, I've already adopted you."

"I imagine it is more the other way around, considering you barely know how to read."

Gilbert laughed. "Well, shit, that's true. Still, I know all the best drinking places in Hell, so I can still teach you a couple of things."

"Angels cannot indulge in such vice!"

"Not with that attitude," said the albino, slinging a companionable arm around Gabriel's shoulders. "Butt under my wing, you're gonna fucking _flourish_."

Ordinarily, Gabriel would have bellowed at him to show some respect, but he for some reason he found himself in a surprisingly good mood. As such, he only elbowed Gilbert in the ribs a little bit on the way to the office.

* * *

><p><strong>Y'all better click that review button real quick or I'm gonna have to break into your rooms at night and pee on everything you love <strong>(◕‿◕✿)

**I will pee on your mother. I will pee on your cat. Don't play with me man I'm a crazy motherfucker I'll do this shit  
><strong>

**Nah I'm kidding I love yo asses I won't pee on your mom**

**But seriously though. Review. **


	10. Thursday Evening

"Give me the electric company."

"I am not giving you the electric company, I'm like two rolls away from getting paid, I am _not_ giving you the electric compan-"

"_Give me the electric company."_

Kiku sighed and handed over the electric company.

They were sitting in the living room with a Monopoly board balanced on the coffee table. Yao had about six hotels and was cackling quietly to himself with every turn. Kiku, surprisingly, wasn't doing so badly considering it was a Thursday, and had all the railroads and three houses. Soo had managed to land himself in jail again, although that was hardly revolutionary news. They only played Monopoly when they were _really bored_, since Yao seemed to have some sort of unnatural and utterly bizarre ability at the game. Despite forcing Kiku to hand over no fewer than three pieces of property, Soo managed to lose. As per usual, he flipped the board. Plastic houses and paper money went flying everywhere, the dog token (which Yong Soo always insisted on using) bouncing off Kiku's forehead. Soo crossed his arms over his chest and scowled. "I don't want to play this game anymore."

"That's what you said three days ago, and now look where we are," Yao pointed out.

Kiku started gathering the abused pieces into a neat pile. "I have a very bad feeling."

"Why? It's not like anything's happened recently. No zombies, no weird supernatural creatures, no Pochi falling out a window."

"He didn't fall, you _threw _him," replied Kiku tersely. "And that's not what I was talking about. What day is it today?"

"Thursday."

"And who just lost at Monopoly?"

"I did!" Soo piped up.

"Exactly." Kiku ran a hand through his hair, glancing at the calendar on the wall. "Thursday is the day I have bad luck. Every week without fail for the last twenty-six years of my life, Thursday has always been a cursed day. My luck is fine every other day, but the God of Thursdays has singled me out to bear the brunt of his vendetta. Normally I can't even make myself breakfast without spilling my tea or burning my toast of being attacked by dyslexic legions of the undead. But who lost at Monopoly today? Not me. _Yong Soo_ did."

Yao faltered. "Maybe you're being pessimistic. Maybe your luck is finally changing for the better!"

Kiku turned to him with cold, dead eyes. "My luck will _never_ get better."

Yao and Soo shrank back involuntarily. "Well. What does that mean for us, then?"

Turning away, Kiku stared out the window into the clear, crisp blue sky that would probably turn into another apocalypse before the month was out. "It means that something much worse is going to happen than me losing at Monopoly."

"I think that's a little far –fetched," Yao said, right before the door imploded.

* * *

><p>"Step right up, see the marvel for yourself! The very latest innovation in artificial intelligence, the latest breakthrough in science! Grab your chance to own your very own robot man, artistically sculpted to look like the Roman statues of yore! Needs no feeding, changing, cleaning or charging! Completely solar-powered and doesn't rely on electricity, a marvel of robotic longevity! Have a conversation about philosophy, get him to teach you about Ancient history, or stick him in your garden to impress the neighbours!"<p>

"What," Herakles hissed, "is the meaning of this?"

"I am trying to sell you," Sadiq hissed back so the throng of bystanders wouldn't hear.

They were outside the salon, a large crowd of regular customers and curious onlookers gathered to listen to the handsome Turk's sales pitch. He stood on an old crate, shouting through a rolled-up newspaper. Beside him was what looked like an ordinary decorative statue, but wait long enough and you'd see it move.

"How much?" called one person.

"We'll start the bidding at eight hundred dollars!" Sadiq called back.

Unseen, Arthur and Francis stood apart from the crowd and watched in disbelief.

"You don't think that's the missing soul, do you?"

Francis frowned. "Preposterous. How could a statue summon Death?"

"Beats me, mate. How does a statue even talk?"

"He might just be an actor painted to look like a statue."

"I doubt trying to sell him would be entirely legal, then."

They fell silent.

"Should we tell Gabriel about this?" Arthur hazarded.

Francis considered this. "Let's wait for a while. I want to see if anyone actually buys him."

* * *

><p>A young man wandered the streets on New York, saddened that his holiday was going to end soon.<p>

It had been a lovely two weeks. The people had been hospitable, the sights had been amazing, and the culture had been absolutely fascinating. The snow still hadn't melted, and the young man looked on with pleasure at the white-capped skyscrapers that made up the city's skyline. It would be a shame to leave all this behind, but he couldn't wait to tell his family all about it when he finally got back to Madrid.

He seemed to be lost, although he didn't mind this in the slightest. Nobody was around, which made sense because he seemed to be in a back alley of some sort, but if he just kept going he should find someone from whom he could ask directions. In the meantime, he decided, he would enjoy his last few days taking in the atmosphere.

A slender figure emerged from between two buildings, and the tourist smiled. His mother had always said that good things came to those who waited, and he had waited, and now he had a good thing! All he had to do was ask for directions to get back to his hostel, and he'd be all set. He jogged up to the stranger, waving to catch his attention. The man turned, and the tourist realized with some glee that this was a _very attractive_ man. He stopped right in front of him, panting slightly.

The other man spoke first. "Why, hello! Are you alright?"

"Yes," replied the tourist with a smile, in the act of pulling out the card with the address of his lodgings. The strange man glanced at this and his face broke into a smile.

"Oh? Are you on holiday? Are you lost?"

"Yes, yes," replied the tourist, glad that he hadn't had to delve into explanations. Chatting was nice, but having to explain things was boring, and he could do without the extra hassle. The stranger took his card with a dazzling smile, and the tourist returned it.

"I'm Tino. Come one, let's get you back," he said warmly.

The Spaniard followed amicably, tucking his hands in his pockets and whistling a cheery tune. He didn't think much of it when Tino led him into an even darker alley. He was mildly surprised when Tino came very close and loosened his scarf. He was pleasantly confused (and slightly aroused) when Tino placed a kiss on the side of his neck. He didn't quite know what to think when Tino bit down and it _hurt_ _like a bitch._

He wasn't thinking anything at all when he crumpled like a ragdoll on the filthy ground.

Tino wiped his lips and smiled, patting his cheeks. "My, that was satisfying," he said, pleased that some rosiness was returning to his face. "The steaks never were _quite_ rare enough."

* * *

><p>"Alright, I understand why Gilbert is here, but why are <em>you<em> here?"

Feliciano batted his eyelashes so hard that Gabriel felt a mild breeze. "I thought you guys could use some help! Not with lifting heavy boxes or anything, I think you can handle all that yourself, hee."

"That's all very well and good," Gabriel replied slowly, "but you haven't done a single thing since you got here but lounge on the sofa and wink at me. Are you trying to communicate to me in some sort of code? It can't be Morse, because the message makes no sense-"

Gilbert silenced him with a hand on his arm. "Lud. You have bigger things to worry about than Feli."

Gabriel coughed and tore his gaze away from the intruding demon. "Yes, of course. We must continue looking through the files."

"Great job you've done organizing everything, by the way. Just the way I'd have done it myself."

Despite himself, Gabriel felt a smidgeon of pride. "It was hard work. The previous Bookkeeper was not as meticulous, and I have yet to transfer everything onto softcopies as you have done. It took almost three months to complete the backlog of work from when the invasion of the Undead Legion came to pass two years ago."

Gilbert and Feliciano shared a sidelong look. Gabriel rolled his eyes.

"I am well aware that the two of you were directly involved in the matter."

"Hey, it was an honest mistake-"

"You became the Earth's first zombie. You ate _six people._"

Gil had, at least, the decency to look abashed. "I got hungry."

Gabriel spared a withering glance for Feliciano, who shuffled his feet meekly. "And you got caught up in Alfred's foolishness and left your duties unfulfilled, didn't you? That was what exacerbated the whole mess."

"Um. Yes. Theoretically that could be possible."

"We're real sorry, though," Gilbert added. Gabriel snorted.

"I am aware your acts of mass destruction weren't intentional. The two of you combined have the scheming ability of a salad. Not a very intelligent salad, either."

"Rude," said Gilbert.

"I hope it's a tomato salad," said Feliciano.

Gabriel didn't really need to say anything after that.

The search barely took twenty minutes, due to Gabriel's superior organizing ability. A yellowing, fraying sheet of paper was unearthed from one of the topmost filing cabinets, which Gabriel had to fly up to get while his visitors stayed on the ground. He floated down, checking over the short list quickly. "The twenty-seventh day of the summer solstice, four hundred and thirty-two years before the birth of Christ, three minutes after sundown," he muttered, frowning deeply and running his finger down the list. "There are two names here."

Gilbert looked over his shoulder and pretended he could read what was written. "You mean they died at the exact same time? Like, together?"

"Unlikely. Their names are very different. Tino Väinämöinen and Herakles Karpusi. They sound like tow completely different nationalities. Travel was not so easy back in those times."

"So if those are the ones you're missing, then all we have to do is go out and get them back, right?"

Gabriel sat down next to Feliciano, who immediately attached himself to the angel like barnacle and was subsequently shaken off. "I hope so. Things are not always so easy. I can only take the souls back if they are not bonded to a body. Otherwise it counts as causing Death, and that is forbidden by members of the Otherworld."

Gilbert sat on Feliciano, who uttered a muttered squeak but otherwise didn't protest. "Can't that creepy (and totally hot) chick do it?"

"She does not _cause_ Death, she _is_ Death. There is a difference. And she still is not allowed to kill, she only collects souls once they have expired. Perhaps this might be tricky."

"Yikes. So what are you gonna do?"

"I don't know." Gabriel sighed and put his head in his hands. "This was not part of my job description."

Feliciano reached around Gilbert to pat the angel consolingly on the arm. "Cheer up, you'll do just fine! You're Gabriel, aren't you? You can do anything. You're cool, and big, and strong, and smart!" And handsome, too, but Feliciano wasn't about to mention that just yet.

"…that's very nice of you to say, although I'm not sure I deserve such high praise," Gabriel mumbled, ears slightly red. "I shall call the Transporter, and perhaps we will be able to come up with a battle plan when he has done his work for the day. Speaking of work, how long have the two of you been slacking here?" he said, standing up suddenly. "I sincerely hope you didn't leave your stations unmanned."

"Nope!" said Feliciano cheerfully. "I learnt my lesson last time! I got a replacement so I could come spend time with you two. Corpse Corps will be none the wiser."

* * *

><p>Romano scowled and took a gulp of his coffee, glaring at anyone who dared to send a questioning gaze his way. As a receptionist, he was probably doing abysmally, but he didn't really care very much seeing as it wasn't his job to lose. Feet planted firmly on the table, he continued his three-hour coffee break and silently dared anyone to object. One demon leant over to the next cubicle and whispered.<p>

"Does Feliciano seem a little…_more demonic _today?"

* * *

><p><strong>It seems I'm slowly slipping back into my previous writing style of "short, silly and all over the place". Well, I don't really mind.<br>**

**I've taken a look at some of the height charts for the Hetalia characters, and...really, I can't take them seriously at all -laughs- Really, I can't imagine Russia and Sweden being six feet tall. Them being six feet while somehow simultaneously managing to tower over everyone...it's not that 182cm is _short_ or anything, it's just that those two are behemoths and I can't accept them being anything shorter than 6'6".**

**And Belarus and Hungary are a disgrace. Really, _five foot three?_ I refuse to stand for this. I want to see tall, slender, model-esque Belarus who walks around in stilettos and gets heads a-turning. I want Amazonian Hungary with curves and muscles strong enough to crush a man's head between her thighs. I want to see them at 5'10 _at the very least._ Also give me huge matronly Ukraine because man do I love me some tall ladies. **

**Also Lithuania who looks tiny next to Russia, but catch him on his own and you quickly realise why his national pastime is basketball. **

**That being said, people tend to get taller as time goes by. Does that mean that the nations get taller as the years go by too? "Imagine Japan in the 1200's being miniature," says Zoe. :')**

**Well, hate to sound pathetic, but it's time for me to grovel and plead that you leave a comment! It's very encouraging to see that people read what you write. I always reply, so please don't be shy to come talk to me! **

**Also, I know I've already done the whole gushing over Free! thing, but if anyone here also happens to be in the Free!dom, I've started a multichap called Persons of Interest if you'd like to check it out. As the title suggests it's an action-packed (sort of) criminal AU. I'd really appreciate it if you could check it out and give me your opinions so I know what I'm doing wrong/right!**

**I can see you skipping the review button. I'm always watching. **

**(◞≼ o ≽◟◞౪◟◞≼ o ≽◟)**

**...I may have found an entire website full of terrifying emoticons. **


	11. Thursday Night and Friday Morning

Talking to Gabriel was normally more intimidating.

At the moment, though, Arthur was trying to listen to the Archangel speak while having an underdeveloped demon hanging off his arm, and an albino human going through his desk drawers for something to eat. It was a little like the set-up of a bad joke; _two angels, two demons and a human walk into an office…_

Next to him, Francis stifled a smile.

"I see nothing amusing about an empowered Leech on the loose," Gabriel commented dryly.

Francis schooled his features immediately, looking properly (not really) chastised. "I'm very sorry, Gabriel, please forgive me."

"His name's Ludwig-"

"It is _not_." Gabriel sighed and rubbed at his temples with the hand that didn't have Feliciano attached to it. "Please try to focus on the matter at hand. If the information given to you by Death is accurate, which I believe it is, then there is a member of the undead currently in possession of his soul. He has access to some very dangerous magic that should have been destroyed eons ago. According to my logs, there are in fact _two _souls missing. Bearing this in mind, it is possible that the two are acting in tandem with one another."

Gilbert wandered over to the desk, having somehow located a protein bar that Feliciano immediately asked for a bite of and subsequently wrinkled his nose at. "Both those dudes died at like, the same time, right?"

"Yes, they did," Gabriel murmured, steepling his fingers contemplatively. "I wonder."

"I don't quite like this," Arthur said, gaze drifting to the protein bar in Gilbert's hand.

"I don't quite like you," Gilbert replied.

Arthur raised an impressive eyebrow. "Noted, but that wasn't what I meant. Something doesn't add up. Perhaps it _is_ possible that these rogues are in cahoots with one another, but it seems altogether too convenient that they both died at the same time."

"Perhaps they were attacked by the same Leech," Francis suggested, moving over so Gilbert could join them on the couch. "If, say, they'd both been ambushed, then it would make sense that Death would take their souls at the same time."

"But from two completely different locations?" Arthur countered. "They were halfway across the continent from one another. Even if they'd met up later and decided to pair off, doesn't it seem at all odd that they share a deathdate?"

"I'd forgotten that," Francis sighed, leaning back against the sofa. "It worries me that the Leech's motives are so obscure. With the last Apocalypse, it was very easy. People died, came back as zombies, ate other people, _ad naseum_. Even when their goals became more sophisticated, they did us the courtesy of announcing their plans over national television."

Gilbert, who had refused to meet anyone's eye after the mention of zombies, studied the ceiling intently. "Sure do miss being on Earth. Good food, fun stuff to do, and those kids weren't half bad either."

"What kids?" Feliciano asked, slowly melting all over Gabriel's desk and crumpling his paperwork.

"Oh, you know." Gil made a vague hand gesture. "That kid, the one who kept calling me Brian. And his pals, the Japanese guy and the Chinese guy."

Arthur perked up. "You know, Yao was a lot of help the last time. He found a way to contact us to alert us of what we- er, of what happened on Earth. He's got some sort of second sight."

Gabriel frowned slightly at the slip-up, but chose to let it go for the moment. "Is he sensitive to the voices of the dead?"

"Apparently. He has some form of clairvoyance. I didn't ask him about it in much detail."

Francis scratched at his goatee. "I wonder if he will have any idea of what is happening now?"

"He might well do." Arthur turned, straightening up at the idea that they might have a lead. "Even if he doesn't, we could always ask us to keep his ears open. It can't be a bad thing to have a psychic on your team."

"I'd like to know how a live human is so familiar with the two of you," Gabriel narrowed his eyes.

Francis tried to shuffle back into the couch, although this accomplished nothing. "Well, that's neither here nor there-"

"Anyway, we'd best be going," Arthur chirruped in a way that didn't suit him at all. He stood, dragging Francis by the sleeve. "Early to bed, early to rise, birds eating worms and all that. No good sitting around wasting time in a cushy office, gotta get, what'dyou call it, down to business," he babbled, unzipping a mini portal and shoving his demonic companion before him. "Ta, then, gents!"

The portal closed, and Feliciano, Gilbert and Gabriel were alone once again. Gabriel stared at the empty space the two had disappeared to, grinding his teeth ever so slightly. Gilbert continued admiring the craftsmanship of the ceiling paint.

Feliciano, oblivious to the situation, folded an important-looking document into a paper plane and giggled.

* * *

><p>"What do you mean, he isn't here?"<p>

Kiku made a little whimpering noise and clutched his dog to his chest. "He's not _here_. We were sitting here playing Monopoly and minding our own business, and then someone broke in and kidnapped him!"

"Knocked us out, too," grumbled Soo, rubbing at an ugly bruise on his jaw. "If they'd had a fair fight, I woulda kicked all their asses and then some. They took us by surprise, so there wasn't anything we could do."

"That's all very well and good," Arthur said, flicking a little bit of healing energy at Yong Soo's face, "but who are 'they'?"

"We don't know." Kiku slipped sideways until he was lying on the couch, staring miserably at the wall. "All I saw was that they were big and blond. We've filed a police report but it's Thursday and nobody's taking me seriously."

Francis patted him absently on the shoulder. "_Ange_, this seems awfully suspicious, doesn't it?"

"I'll bet my halo they're all connected," Arthur muttered, tapping his foot on the carpet. "We might need to go back to the place we started. Perhaps we'll be able to gather more clues."

"Back to the salon?" Francis quickly withdrew his hand just before Pochi could bite it. "I suppose it's a start. This time we should ask around, see if anything fishy strange has been occurring."

"What are you talking about?" Soo asked, leaning forward. "And what does Yao have to do with it?"

Arthur looked at his friend and sighed. "Alright, listen closely. It's a bit of an odd story."

* * *

><p>"I think," said Tino, "that cameras are the best things to have ever been invented."<p>

Yao made a face. He was tied up and sitting on the floor of an expensive hotel room, glaring up at the five strangers who had kidnapped him from the comfort of his apartment. He hadn't been roughed up too much, but being manhandled and transported in the back of a stuffy van (and mind you, _unwillingly so_) had understandably put him in a foul mood. He'd been there for a day, and his wrists were starting to hurt from being tied when he wasn't in the bathroom.

Tino was, naturally, not bothered by this in the least. Instead he reclined on his bed, snapping yet another selfie to upload onto all of his social media accounts. "You know," he said, "it's only been a few days and I've got 6,000 followers. I think this is pretty swell progress."

"I don't care," Yao replied tersely. Tino smiled.

"I have a vision," he said, sitting forward so he could look at Yao properly. "I have a vision where I, a handsome Scandinavian man, am loved. Not by one special person, or any of that nonsense. I couldn't care less about that. I want to be loved by the masses. I want to amass a following that will adore me, worship me, and listen to my every whim."

"I think you might have some issues that you need to sort out."

"Perhaps," Tino smiled, and the fluorescent lights glinted off his teeth. "Perhaps I need help. Because, you see, I have done some very bad things in order to get where I am, and one of them involved trapping the anthropomorphic personification of Death. Ordinarily, that would get me into trouble. Most definitely, it would get me attention. Not the kind of attention I want, you understand. The type I'd rather avoid."

Yao's hand twitched. He was itching for his phone. If he couldn't call Kiku or Yong Soo for help, he might at least get lucky and receive a spirit text that would tell him what to do. However, Tino had confiscated his phone (naturally), and Yao was left with no means of communication at all. "So what do you want me for?"

"Well." Tino stood and went to the coffee table, which was littered with newspapers and empty pastry packages. He picked up a copy of last week's newspaper and shook a page out so Yao could see it. "Wang Yao, clairvoyant extraordinaire. Have a look into your future and prepare for the rest of your life." He withdrew the newspaper and instead came close enough to smile at Yao up close. "Sounds useful, doesn't it?"

"What kind of nutjob kidnaps a psychic from a newspaper?!"

"Nutjob?" Tino settled onto the couch. "Well, I'll admit, part of the reason I took you was just because I was curious and I wanted to see if you were all talk. The other reason is because I've heard a lot of good things about you. Your website is very well-received. You have to be worth something if you've got all those rave reviews, right? Who better to watch my back than a man who sees trouble before it happens?"

"You're crazy. Completely psycho", Yao muttered, glancing out the window for some hope at salvation. The only sight that met him was an electronic billboard trying to convince him he needed chocolate. He could have used the break, but maybe not the Kit Kat.

His captor considered this for a minute. "Yes, maybe. But right now, I'm the psycho who's got you trussed up like a Christmas turkey, and I'd really like to see what's in my future."

"Can't tell you a thing until you give me my phone."

"I understand my accomplices don't give off a very intelligent vibe, but I'm not quite stupid enough to do that."

"Good luck getting your fortune told, then."

"I trust you'll find some way around it. Otherwise you might find yourself falling out the seventh-floor window, instead."

Yao grimaced. He was useless without his phone, because the spirits could only communicate with him through text message. He wouldn't be able to text back, considering there was never a return number, but he might at least get some form of guidance. If he didn't think of something quickly, he'd meet the same fate that Pochi did two years ago, and this time he probably wouldn't have anyone around to bring him back to life. He could always make something up on the spot. That was a temporary solution, at best, because Tino would eventually realize Yao's predictions weren't coming true, and then he might find himself in an even worse situation.

He stared out the window helplessly, wondering where his friends were and whether they were alright. The advertisement for Kit Kat changed into something else.

Yao blinked. It was weird to see in ad in Mandarin in the middle of New York City.

It was even weirder that the ad didn't say anything but the words, _bring friends_.

Yao grinned.

"You know," he said, "I wasn't kidding. There are some special things I need to tell fortunes. Tea leaves, my crystal ball, the incense burner. And my assistants, they're very important as well."

"Oh?" Tino smiled languidly. "You can't do without?"

"Nope." Yao wiggled until he was facing his captors. "Need ambiance. Need the right mood."

This didn't seem to please Tino overly much, but he eventually shrugged. "Whatever, no skin off my nose. Who am I stealing?"

"The two men from my apartment," said Yao quickly. "Kiku and Yong Soo. Bring them both here and then we can help you. But don't hurt them, or I'm not going to do a thing."

"I don't think you're in a position to be making demands of me," the man chuckled, waving over the tall blond built like a brick wall. "Berwald, go back to the apartment with Mattias later and get the two men dear Yao is telling us about. If they resist, don't be afraid to break their arms."

Berwald nodded and shuffled off to do his master's bidding. Tino watched him go with a fond smile, and then turned back to his prisoner. "I do hope you live up to the hype, my friend."

Yao smiled back radiantly. "I tend to surprise people."

* * *

><p><strong>Well I've been restless all week because my results were supposed to come out on Tuesday. Things didn't go quite as I expected them to, but it all worked out in the end, and long story short, I'm going to be packing my bags and heading off to the land of tea and crumpets to study law and anthropology. Life's gonna start getting real hectic real soon but I am excite.<br>**

** LSE hella dumb, accepting my stupid ass and shit. **

( ख़ืིڞ◟྄ख़ืི)** I hope my senpais will notice me this year.**

**I realise reading what I write must be really bizarre, considering I say "colour" and "favourite" but I also say "potato chips" instead of crisps. The reason is because Malaysia was one of the UK's (many, many) colonies, so we learnt British English at first. Once the troops vamoosed, though, we started picking things up from the Americans instead. That's why newer slang tends to sound more Americanised, whereas older words have a distinct lime flavour. **

**I learnt to speak English from watching TV. Hence, I had an American accent until I was three.**

**Please review!**


	12. Saturday Afternoon

"So you've got a portal open."

"Yes, _ange_, I have a portal open directly into their living room."

"And we'll be able to tell just in case something bad happens to them?"

"Yes_,_ we will be the first to know aside from themselves."

"And you're absolutely sure there's no way we might miss them-"

"_Arthur_." Francis spun around and placed both hands on his friend's shoulders. "You need to calm down. I know they are fragile mortals, but they handled themselves well the last time they were in trouble, no? You and I have nothing to fear. We will watch over them as well as we possibly can."

Arthur couldn't keep his gaze locked onto Francis's for very long. He sighed and shuffled his feet, managing to sound both worried and irritable. "I _know._ I just really don't want another apocalypse."

"At least this time it won't be our fault," Francis said brightly, wrapping a friendly arm around Arthur's shoulder and leading him forward. "Now come. We have a man and a statue to interrogate."

* * *

><p>Yong Soo sat in his bedroom, clutching his pillow to his chest. Kiku was in the living room watching TV. Although Soo couldn't see it himself, he'd been assured there was some sort of magical portal right in front of him, connecting him to the angel and the demon. It didn't make him feel safe per se, but it helped to know he wasn't alone in the apartment. What's more, it was a Saturday, not a Thursday, so Kiku wasn't currently the personification of misfortune and probably wouldn't fuck up their plans too badly.<p>

Said plans were simple, really. All they had to do was stay like this for as long as possible. If whoever took Yao came back, they would let themselves be kidnapped. Then Francis and Arthur would follow unseen, and free the three of them, possibly also while kicking some criminal ass.

In the meantime, the most they could do was sit tight and hope Yao was okay.

* * *

><p>"This isn't okay," said Yao bitterly.<p>

Tino, unsurprisingly, didn't look too abashed. "I run a very successful blog, you know. In order to appeal to a wider demographic, I need to show a bit of diversity in my group of friends. I mean, look at us," he said, gesturing to the four other white, blond people in the room. "I don't want anyone getting the wrong idea."

"You're reducing me to the colour of my skin! A stereotype!"

"That's a little hypocritical, don't you think? I mean, you're the one in charge of a mystical Chinese fortune-telling agency. If anything, you've stereotyped yourself. You really should have thought of that before you went the way of the fortune cookie."

"Those aren't even really Chinese!"

"There's a lesson in there, probably," said Tino primly, trying to take a selfie of the both of them that didn't involve Yao scowling. "I'll get you whatever you want for dinner tonight if you'll stop pulling that face, you're seriously bumming me out."

"Bite me."

"Don't tempt me."

"If you kill me, you'll be a suspect," Yao said suddenly, trying a different train of thought. "People will see photos of us and connect us. In fact, my friends have probably filed a missing persons' report. If people see us together they'll know you kidnapped me."

Tino blinked. "Why, I'm not going to _kill_ you, don't be ridiculous."

Yao blinked back. "…you're not?"

Placing a soothing hand on Yao's shoulder, Tino smiled. "Of course not, pal. That'd just waste all your delicious blood."

* * *

><p>Sadiq's dog, an improbably shaggy mongrel with droopy eyes and the unfortunate misconception that it was a lapdog, stared hard at Herakles from across the hall of the apartment. Herakles stared back.<p>

Sadiq emerged from the kitchenette holding a mug of tea and a plate of something sweet. He blinked at Herakles, then at his dog, and cracked a half-smile. "Don't hurt yourself."

Herakles didn't budge. If he hadn't suddenly decided to speak, Sadiq would have assumed he'd fallen asleep. "I'm not fond of dogs. Yours is especially antagonistic."

"What're you talking about, he's such a softie," Sadiq scoffed, flopping onto the couch without upsetting his afternoon snack. The dog, affectionately and somewhat redundantly named 'Dog', immediately stuck its nose into Sadiq's leg in the hopes of being fed. Dog noses, as it turned out, were still wet even through sweatpants, so he pushed the offending thing away with a foot and held his almond cookies aloft to keep them safe. "Acıbadem?"

"Bless you," replied Herakles.

Sadiq snorted. "Right, I forgot you can't eat anything onaccounta you're a statue. What's that like, anyway?"

"Unpleasant, as you can no doubt imagine," the statue replied somewhat irritably, although it sounded strange in his sleepy, gravelly voice. "I'm sluggish, stiff, inflexible and unable to enjoy even the smallest of pleasures."

"Such as?"

"Good food. Good wine. Good company at night-"

"I'm only willing to offer two out of three of those things," Sadiq interjected. "I'll let you figure out which two, though."

"I'm indebted," Herakles replied dryly.

Sadiq grinned wider. "Hell yeah, you are. I deserve some sort of thanks for hiding you all this time."

"You tried to _sell_ me."

"I didn't go through with it!"

"Only because nobody would agree to your price!"

"You sayin' I should have gone lower?"

You could say what you wanted about statues, but Herakles really knew how to put the stone into a glare. Sadiq made a snorting sound through his nose and shrugged, taking a second to chew before opening his mouth again.

"Anyway, you come from ancient Greece, so don't you pretend you're not familiar with the slave trade."

"It's not ancient to _me_," Herakles grumbled. "And if you must know, I am not a part of that business. I am a philosopher, and my pursuit is a noble one-"

"Yeah, yeah, you spend all day thinking up paradoxes, unlike some people who actually have to work for a living, I know."

This time, for someone with such an immobile face, Herakles did a good job of expressing the utmost outrage. However, his retort was cut short by a knock on the door.

Sadiq set down his plate with a warning to Dog not to eat any of his food, which was immediately ignored the moment he turned his back. "Go stand in a corner and don't move," he said to Herakles, who grudgingly complied. He wasn't sure who'd be visiting in the middle of the afternoon, because it was still office hours, and his friends would be working. Not his manager or a salon patron, because today was his day off. He definitely wasn't prepared for the handsome blond with the five o'clock shadow and the expensive suit standing outside his door.

"Hello," said the man in a voice like black velvet. "I don't suppose I could come in?"

Sadiq blinked. "You are?"

"Call me Francis," came the reply. "I'd like to talk to you about the statue you wanted to sell."

Sadiq perked up immediately. "You wanna buy him? Cool, cool, come on in, I had some biscuits out but the dog's probably gotten into them by now. Want some tea instead?"

"No thank you, but my companion might."

"You're expecting someone else?"

"Not quite," Francis smiled and guided him to the sofa as though he were a host rather than a visitor. "What you're about to see may come as a bit of a shock."

"I doubt that," said Sadiq, because he'd seen a statue come to life, and there wasn't much else worth seeing after that.

Then, of course, he blinked, and realized that the unassuming man in front of him had a pair of horns, and that apparently a half-man half-bird creature in a toga had followed him into the apartment and was petting the dog who didn't seem terribly surprised, and Sadiq thought that, well, if he was going to be wrong about something, it might as well be this.

* * *

><p>"So you have located Herakles Karpusi?"<p>

"Yes." Arthur's voice was a little staticky on the line, but Gabriel could hear the slight discomfort in his voice, as though he wasn't particularly sure how to feel about his situation. Gabriel couldn't blame him, if what he was saying was true.

"And the soul is in a statue?"

"That's right. The statue seems to have come from the same salon that Death was trapped in. I can't be absolutely sure, since I'm only familiar with the theory of these things, but I reckon this soul must have come out by accident when the Leech stole back his own soul. Karpusi doesn't seem to know anything about Leeches or runes, but he does remember the Otherworld."

"Is he one of ours?"

"District seven," Arthur clarified, referring to one of the older neighbourhoods in Heaven. "He must have been pulled out and gotten lodged in the statue. I suppose it makes sense; Death must have been trying to balance things out by taking one from Heaven and one from Hell."

"So this Tino character is one of the souls from Hell?"

"Looks like it."

"…and he's on the loose?'

"Yeah."

Sometimes, Gabriel felt that he sighed hard enough to make his lungs collapse. Being immortal, of course, they didn't, but it was a close thing. "Follow Karpusi and try to determine how to release the soul from the statue," he said. "Do not break the law, though, Arthur. Do not try to take the soul by yourself."

"I _know_ that," replied the Transporter irritably. "D'you think I fancy getting my arse thrown out of Heaven? I won't try to take his life, don't be silly. You're right, though, Francis and I are going to see if we can get anything else out of him."

"Good luck, and do not shirk your duties while you investigate."

"Yeah, yeah, mum," Arthur grumbled and hung up. Gabriel sighed again.

Feliciano, bizarrely, was still in his office, and he patted the angel reassuringly on the arm. "There, there. Francis is nice and he'll figure something out. Even if he doesn't, you will! You aren't God's right hand for no reason, you know."

"I suppose so," Gabriel groaned quietly, too mentally tired to be embarrassed by Feliciano's unsubtle praise. "This is far more trouble than I would have preferred."

"At least it's not as bad as it could be," Feliciano shrugged.

Almost on cue, Gilbert burst through the door, holding a stack of papers high enough to block most of his face. "Hey, Lud, you wanna help me reorganize all this paperwork while we wait?"

Gabriel sighed louder and reached out blindly. "Feliciano. I have lost my will to live. If you have any compassion, kill me now. Gore me through the heart with the horns on your head."

Feliciano bumped his head against Gabriel's chest. "Is it working?" he asked somewhat anxiously.

Gabriel was, unfortunately, still alive, so no. "It isn't. You're doing an excellent job at poking me in the ribs, though," he said and sighed again.

* * *

><p><strong>I was very sure I had something to say here, but I've forgotten what it was.<strong>

**EDIT: I remember now. I went to Turkey a few years ago (while writing ADAZ, actually) and there were stray dogs _everywhere._ They were the cutest thing. That being said, there was a part of Turkey that had Greek ruins in it (can't for the life of me remember how they got there, but their eternal rivalry probably has something to do with it) and there were no dogs there, only cats. So, I think that explains why Sadiq has a dog here. Also, because he lives to antagonise Herakles, who is a cat person, so. **

**I really, really like dogs. I had this one friend I'd go out with, and sometimes while we were talking in the cab on the way somewhere, he'd go "dog!" and I'd drop whatever I was talking about and be like WHERE. Fucker used to laugh.**

**Therefore, I'm not even sorry for Dog.**

**Has anyone seen that video of the baby goat screaming? It's like. Really loud.**

**Also, tips for packing for uni?**

**Please join me in enthusing about dogs or alternatively hurl abuse at me in the comments section. **


	13. Sunday Night and Monday Morning

It was hard to play Mario Kart with shaking hands.

It didn't particularly help that Kiku wasn't being weighed down by an unnatural, Thursday-induced bout of bad luck. That being said, despite outward appearances, Soo could tell that Kiku was nervous as well.

He set down his controller and sighed. "All this waiting is killing me."

Kiku paused the game, but didn't turn to look at him. "I wish we could go to the source, if only to see whether or not Yao is safe."

"I'm more worried about whether or not _we're_ safe," grumbled his companion. "I mean, I know Arthur and Francis said they'd be looking out for us, but a guy can't help but worry."

"I understand." Sighing slightly as he heaved himself off their overly-soft couch, Kiku made his way to the kitchen to help himself to something from the fridge. "All the same, it's infinitely better to be under their protection than without it."

"You're under _my_ protection, and that's like, 500 times better. I do Tae Kwon Do, you know."

"That makes me feel better, actually," said Kiku sincerely, right before the door imploded for the second time that week.

* * *

><p>"I think I understand."<p>

"You do? I'm glad. I'm not sure I'm in a position to explain everything properly right now, sorry about that."

"No, I get it," said Soo quite pleasantly.

Yao smiled. "Thanks, man."

"I get that you SPECIFICALLY ASKED A GROUP OF PSYCHOS TO KICK DOWN OUR DOOR AND ABDUCT US FROM OUR OWN HOME!_"_

Yao only had time to squawk before he was attacked by an angry Korean to the stomach. "Look, I only did what the spirits said! I didn't know they'd tie you up and throw you in this hotel room with me!"

"What the hell did you think would happen?" Yong Soo paused in biting Yao's elbow just long enough to scream at him. "Did you think Kiku and I would ride in with an aerosol spray and a lighter and take down a fucking unstoppable vampire and his freaky worshipers?"

Yao didn't quite wail, but it was a close thing. "Kiku, please, help me! He's kneeing me in the ribs and it really hurts!"

Kiku stared ahead, hands curled tightly into fists despite being bound behind his back. "There's nothing happening. Nothing at all. I'm in the apartment playing video games, and there is no vampire going to kill me and drink my blood."

"You see what you did? You put him in _denial_," Yong Soo planted an accusatory foot in Yao's face and immediately fell over. "He hasn't done that since the zombie apocalypse!"

"That was because _you_ put a dyslexic zombie in the car with us that time," Yao retorted and rolled away to escape his roommate's wrath.

Soo rolled after him. "I swear to all the gods that exist, Yao, if your angel-demon duo of friends hadn't decided to keep an eye on us, I would find a way to kill you with the carpeting and my teeth!"

Yao paused. "Arthur and Francis? They know we're here?"

It wasn't very easy to sit up, so Soo stayed on the floor. "They came by looking for you right after you got taken away. It was their idea to open up one of their magic portal things just in case those blond guys came back."

"So they're here?"

"I don't know," Soo huffed and rolled onto his face. "If they are, we can't see them. Last thing I remember is having a sack put over my head and being thrown in a car."

Yao pondered this. "This must be what the spirits had been planning. They saved us the last time, and with any luck they'll be able to save us again."

"Whatever happens, I'm just glad it's not a Thursday," Kiku sighed.

* * *

><p>In the adjoining room, Nikolai flipped through a book of spells. It wasn't one of his (his were, in fact, not much more than glorified cookbooks), but one lent to him by Tino. As a small thank you for serving (and occasionally feeding) him, Tino allowed the Cult to see what <em>real<em> magic looked like. To his great astonishment, Nikolai had successfully completed two Summonings with Tino's help (one resulted in a very, very large three headed dog that wandered around and chewed at Ari's shoelaces until they sent it back. The other called up an irritable-looking brown-haired guy that asked for coffee, and then huffed and left of his own accord when Nikolai gave him some out of a packet. Nikolai wasn't counting the one that happened between those two, because it had ended up with a very confused, very naked angel with a sock covering his privates, and Nikolai had sent him back immediately).

He'd done as much research as he could about vampires, but all he'd been able to find thus far were descriptions of rabies and excerpts from Twilight. He'd been debating about asking Tino point-blank for a while now, but would that be rude? Would he sound ignorant? Racist? Were vampires a race or a separate species? The occasional pint from his arm notwithstanding, would Tino eat him if he got offended?

He was overthinking things, probably, but he had a sneaking suspicion he was Tino's favourite at the moment, and he didn't want to ruin it. Luckily for him, though, Mattias had no such selfish desires, and promptly pointed a finger when he saw Tino polish off his second slice of garlic bread that day.

"Hey, you know, I'm really confused, I always thought vampires couldn't eat any garlic, but you've eaten almost nothing but garlic, and it's weird, you know? You know? Tinoooo?"

Nikolai facepalmed, Ari sighed and Berwald did nothing, although that was hardly breaking news. However, all three of them slid their gazes towards Tino to see how he'd react. The vampire, to their great relief, only gave Mattias the type of smile a mother would give her curious and perpetually sticky child.

"Dear Mattias, before I met you, I was a very different man. Why, I don't know if you'd even call me a man, in the purest sense of the word, because I was missing something that all of you had. Do you know what that is?"

"A peni-"

"The ability to die?" Nikolai interjected quickly.

Tino patted him gently on the hand. "You're half right. I could not die, but that was a symptom rather than an affliction. The reason I could not die, and the reason I could not eat garlic, and the reason I could not step into a church, or into a house without invitation, was because I didn't have a soul. I was, how to put it, not entirely whole."

Ari perched on the armrest of the sofa. "But now?"

"Now, I have my soul back, thanks to you and Death. My previous… disabilities don't bother me anymore."

"So basically," Nikolai tilted his head, "you're still a vampire, but without the weaknesses?"

Tino grinned. "Exactly."

Mattias flopped cross-legged onto the floor, right at their feet. "Okay, so now you're a superhero! What's next?"

"Now," Tino reached out a hand to ruffle Mattias's hair affectionately, "what does every good superhero need?"

"Superpowers?"

"I've already got those."

"A hot girlfriend?"

Tino glanced at Berwald and smirked. "What else?"

"Fans," said Ari quietly.

"Right answer." Tino reached across the sofa to cup Ari's face in his hands and pull him close. "Now, do you like me?"

Ari, normally only marginally more expressive than a brick wall, stiffened slightly and immediately lowered his eyes. He didn't speak, which wasn't unusual, but he didn't stare at the person in front of him with cat-like concentration either, which was slightly bizarre.

Tino released him and laughed. "I'm chuffed. You see, one of the really rad things about the people you call vampires is that they're charming. Almost unnaturally so," he said, grin widening until it was all teeth and no mirth. "That being said, if you can't walk around in the sun, then you can't win the hearts of the masses, because you'll mostly find shady characters walking around at night. Now imagine someone as strong as me, as handsome as me and as _old_ as me being basically given immortality."

"You'd be the most powerful creature on Earth," said Nikolai with no small amount of wonder.

"I would," said Tino pleasantly.

Nikolai blinked. "You literally have the entire world in your hands at this moment. You could take down armies. You could seduce rulers. People would be powerless against you. If you really wanted to, you could enslave the entire human race!"

"I guess I could," said Tino cheerfully, stretching back till his shoulders popped. "I suppose it's about time for me to try the gentle approach, hmm?"

In the back of the room, entirely invisible and inaudible to non-members of the Otherworld, Francis and Arthur looked at each other and groaned.

* * *

><p>An hour later, in the living room of a humble salon receptionist, an angel and a demon took turns pacing tracts into the carpet.<p>

"An empowered Leech. A _Leech_, on a quest for world domination. He's going to charm the pants off an entire planet of gullible humans, and it'll be the second apocalypse in as many _years_, Francis, oh _no!"_

Francis bit his perfectly-manicured nails. "Alright, _ange_, let's stop for a minute and think. Is this situation really all that bad? It's not as dangerous as the zombie outbreak was. Really, what's the difference between this Leech and, say, the newest Hollywood sweetheart?"

"Hollywood sweethearts don't want to _eat_ people!" Arthur bellowed across the room and then flopped onto the couch. "That madman can't be up to any good. He's going to wreak havoc, I can tell. What if he turns everyone into his mindless followers? What if he turns everyone into people like _him?_ What if he steals all the souls back the way he did with his own? Builds an army? Conquers the Middleworld?"

"As much as I hate to say it, you're probably right," said Francis, and shuffled morosely over to join Arthur on the couch as well.

Sadiq, to his credit, didn't seem all that perturbed by the Otherworldly creatures who had entered his apartment uninvited and made themselves at home on his furniture, and continued to drink his tea in comfort. "I don't know what you're getting so worked up about. It's been weeks and nothing's happened yet, right?"

Arthur grabbed him by the shoulders. "You have no idea how potent a Leech's charm is. Have you heard of vampires? They're basically the same thing. This creature is ancient, evil and very, very patient. Clever, too, by the looks of it."

"Sounds evil. You'd think the demon would be happy about it."

Francis took a moment to look affronted. "Excuse _me_. I will have you know that Corpse Corps has never interfered in human life in such a way, much less tried to brainwash the entire race into becoming customers. The Devil may not have morals, but he has standards. There isn't really any point in _cheating_."

"Point taken," said Sadiq mildly. "Still, why are you in my house-"

"Is there no way to slay the creature?" Herakles rumbled from his corner. Arthur, Sadiq and Francis started; up till now, they'd all assumed the statue was asleep.

Arthur made an exasperated noise. "That's the _thing_. First of all, the Leech has a soul now. By law, Otherworldly inhabitants aren't allowed to interfere with the living. That means we can't kill him."

"You could hire a hitman," said Sadiq helpfully.

"Yes, theoretically, but that brings us to the other, even bigger problem. Now that he's got a soul, this man is invincible. He's got superhuman speed and agility, and isn't affected by the things that would normally hurt a human. Because of the soul, though, he can't be hurt by the things that would hurt a Leech, either. Not garlic, not sunlight, not holy symbols. How do you kill a thing that can't be killed?"

"You can't," said Herakles, settling onto the armchair. "Perhaps it is best to prepare for our fates."

"We are _not_ going to give up," said Arthur hotly. "We're going to find a way to kill him, and then you're going to save your species."

"What do you mean, 'you'? You're not putting this all on us, are you?" Sadiq set down his tea and raised an eyebrow.

Francis patted his knee. "There aren't any other humans we can turn to at the moment. Our only other acquaintances are trapped in the enemy's lair."

"Can't you ask somebody else? The President?"

"Attempts at making humankind aware of the Otherworld have not gone well in the past." As one man, Francis and Arthur recalled the entirety of the Middle Ages, and shuddered.

"I'm not going on a crazy quest for you," said Sadiq.

"You should probably prepare for failure," Herakles advised.

Arthur threw his hands up. "_Stop_that! We're trying to help save the world from becoming a horde of mindless Leech-worshippers! Your lives will be devoid of all meaning! Life as you know it will cease! You'll be doomed to spend the rest of eternity as slaves to an unworthy cause! You will know nothing but your unnatural love for the Leech!"

Horror-tinged realisation dawned on Sadiq's face, spreading slowly like butter melting over a piece of toast. "Are you telling me," he began, placing both hands on Arthur's shoulders for emphasis, "that I won't be able to watch Keeping Up With the Kardashians anymore?"

Arthur blinked. "What?'

Sadiq's voice rose slowly in pitch. "You said that we'll be mindless slaves to him. Will that mean I'll lose my love for Kim? Will I have downloaded the Kardashian game for nothing?"

"Probably," said Herakles maliciously. He'd never quite taken to reality TV.

Sadiq stood, tea forgotten. "This is unacceptable. I won't let this unholy vampire take over our people. Whatever you need me to do, I'm in. Kim is worth it."

"Thanks," said Arthur, not quite sure whether or not to be pleased.

"There's a lesson in irony here," said Francis, but they ignored him.

* * *

><p><strong>Be unapologetic for who you are.<br>**

**I mistyped "but" as "butt" in one of the previous chapters.**

**Please review!**


End file.
